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THE 

QREEN BOOK, 

OR 

GLEANINGS FROM THE WRITING-DESK 

OF 

A LITERARY AGITATOR. 

BV / 

JOHN CORNELIUS O'CALLAGHAN. 



"I am an Irishman, hating injustice, and abhorring with my whole soul the 
oppression of my country ; but I desire to heal her sores, not to aggravate her 
sufferings. In decrying, as I do, the tithe-system, and the whole Church Esta- 
blishment in Ireland, I am actuated by no dislike to the respectable body of 
men, who, in the midst of fear and hatred, gather its spoils. On the contrary, 
I esteem those men, notwithstanding their past and still, perhaps, existing hos- 
tility to the religious and civil rights of their fellow-subjects and countrymen.... 
What I aspire to, is the freedom of the people, ....which can never be effected, 
till injustice, or the oppression of the many by the few, is taken away. And, 
as to religion, what I wish, is to see her freed from the slavery of the state, 
and the bondage of Mammon;. ...her ministers labouring; and receiving their hire 
from those for WKoyi they labour ;....ihdit thus religion maybe restored to her 
empire, which is not of this world, and men once more worship God, in spirit 
and in truth."— Dr. Doyle. 

"He (Doctor Johnson) had a kindness for the Irish nation, and thus gene- 
rouslv expressed himself (in 1T79) to a gentleman from that country, on the 
subject of an Union, which artful politicians have often had in view— 'Do not 
make an Union with us, Sir ; we should unite with you, only to rob you.' "— 
BosicelVs Life of Johnson. 

"Adieu to that Union so called, as ' lucus a non lucendo,^ a Union from never 
uniting; which, in its first operation, gave a death-blow to the independence 
of Ireland, and, in its last, may be the cause of her eternal separation from this 
country. If it must be called a Union, it is the union of the shark with his 
prey; the spoiler swallows up his victim, and thus they become one and indivi- 
sible. Thus has Great Britain swallowed up the parliament, the constitution, 
the independence of Ireland." — Speech of Lord Byron in the House of Lords, 
^pril 1st, IS12. 

" The more Irish officers in the Austrian service, the better. Our troops wfll 
always be disciplined. An Irish coward is an uncommon character; and what 
the natives of Ireland dislike even from principle, they generally perform 
through a desire of glory V'—JMemorandum found in the papers of Francis L Em- 
peror of Germany, after his death, August \^th, 1765. 



PHILADELPHIA! 
PUBLISHED Br M. FITHIAN, 

61 NORTH SECOND SlftEiiT. 

184£. 






^- ^ ^ ^ 



TO 
THE PEOPLE OF IRELAND, 

AS CONTAINING 

SOME FACTS NOT ALTOGETHER UNSERVICEABLE 

TO THE CAUSE OF 

VOLUNTARYISM AND REPEAL, 

AND SOME DEFENCE OF IRISH MILITARY HONOUR 

FROM ENGLISH AND ANGLO-IRISH 

MISREPRESENTATION, 

THIS MISCELLANY 

IS INSCRIBED 

BY THEIR COUNTRYMAN, 

THE AUTHOR. 



1* 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 

Preface ^^ 

I saw thee, Time's rude hand had dimmed 35 

The defeat of Sisera ^^ 

Epigram on the weeping and laughing philosophers 38 

The Temperance Society. A Song 39 

Orrar and Muirne. (From the Irish.) 40 

Epigram, on a wealthy and presuming upstart 42 

Epistle from Dr. Southey, Poet Laureate and author of the Book 

of the Church, to the Editor of the Parson's Horn-Book 42 

Impromptu, written at the time of the Anglesey Proclamations, &C..46 

Let fanatics murmur at life. A Song 46 

A Character 48 

Epigram ^^ 

The Parson's "Horn of Chase." A Parody 49 

Anacreontic ^^ 

Epigram, on reading the Marquis of Londonderry's speech, &c 51 

A Valentine • ^^ 

Words for Music ^3 

On an improvident Vocalist 53 

David's lament over Saul and Jonathan 54 

'Pq *)ic*** • 57 

Impromptu, on seeing a Reverend Dignitary of the EstabUshment 

beating some poor boys from behind his carriage 57 

]N"abis and the Union. (Written upon the passing of the Irish 

Coercion Bill) 58 

Almighty Lord 59 

Impromptu, to Miss "^ 

The Episcopal Mammoth, aUas A-x-d-r the « Great"— of Meath. 

A Parody ^^ 

Song for United Irishmen, or Irishmen United 63 



8 CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

Epigram on a big-mouthed glutton 64. 

A Contrast for the Church .' . 64 

Bring me wine — bring me wine 66 

Epigram, on Miss 67 

Translation from Voltaire's tragedy of Mahomet 67 

Dear isle of my birth, ere I sail from thy shores 77 

Epigram, on a ruby-visaged friend rather partial to his tumbler 78 

Translation from Lucan's PharsaUa 78 

Nay, do not tell me, when we meet 85 

The Duchess of Berri and the Jew 86 

Stanzas 87 

Pikes versus Pike 88 

War song of the Irish Bards before the Battle of Clontarf. 88 

Farewell to my Book 93 



POSTSCRIPT 

TO DR. SOUTHEY's EPISTLE TO THE AUTHOR OF THE PARSON's 

HORN BOOK. 

Reasons for the necessity of substituting state-supported churches 
in every country by the " voluntary system," and more particu- 
larly in Ireland — Origin of the general diffusion of hostility to 
the Irish Church and tithe-system by the formation of the society 
of the original Comet Club, and the publication of the Parson's 
Horn-Book and Comet — Plan of operations against the Church 
adopted by the Club, and its great success — Prosecution and 
true causes of the extinction of the Comet — Correction of the 
misinformation of the Quarterly Review respecting the two socie- 
ties of the Comet Club and the Irish Brigade 97 



POSTSCRIPT 

TO ''David's lament." 

David's Lament and Wolfe's Lines on Sir John Moore — Critical 
defect of the latter as compared with the former poem, and the 
other chief remains of Hebrew song on important national events 
— Obscurity of Wolfe's Unes particularly demonstrated by their 



CONTENTS. 9 

PAGE 

translation into French by Father Prout — Fittest place for those 
lines in a biography of Sir John Moore, or some future standard 
History of England, on the model of the modern French histo- 
rians, Michaud, Barante, and Tliierry — Historical use of national 
songs — Geddes's critical version of, and comments upon, David's 
elegy — Concluding remarks on the monotonous spirituality of 
Hebrew poetry ., 117 



POSTSCRIPT 

TO "NABIS AND THE UNION." 

CHAPTER I. 

Historical sketch of, and resemblance between, Scotch and Irish 
Anti-Unionism, and remarkable official testimony to the pre- 
dominance of Anti-Union sentiments in Ireland .137 

CHAPTER II. 

Inquiry, as regards the idea of maintaining a Union by force, into 
the number of Irish who died in the British army and navy 
during the last half century, and likewise into the comparative 
military quaUties of the British and Irish people 144 

CHAPTER III. 

Statement (in reference to the same idea of a Union) of the com- 
parative size, in geographical square miles, of Ireland, and the 
principal states of Europe, with a view of her great natural capa- 
bilities for being a maritime power, and the peculiar military 
strength of her territory, as combined with the large amount of 
her population, and illustrated by a plan of defensive operations, 
based on Napoleon principles 156 

CHAPTER IV. 

Examination of the assertion of Voltaire and others, that the Irish 
" have always fought badly at home," and confutation of that 
assertion, by an account of what men, and how much domestic • 
dissension and money enabled England to terminate the Eliza- 
bethian and Cromwellian wars 175 



10 CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER V. PAGE 

Extension of the same inquiry, in greater detail, to the Jacobite and 
Williamite war, containing a true, in opposition to the false, or 
British and Anglo-Irish statements, respecting the comparative 
amount of the Irish and English numbers, artillery, &c., at the 
Boyne ; and also a passing review and comments on the events 
of that campaign, including William's repulse at Limerick, 
Marlborough's capture of Cork and Kinsale, the subsequent de- 
feat of Ginckle's attempted winter operations against Kerry and 
Connaught, and the great annoyance given to the invaders by 
the Irish guerillas, or Rapparees 183 

CHAPTER VI. 

Great preparations of the English for the next campaign, or that 
of 1691, and strictures on the equally base and impolitic conduct 
of the French, who, by any thing like proper succours, would 
have enabled the Irish, at the very least, to maintain James on 
the throne of Ireland, as is shown by the events of the war in 
Ulster, previous to Kirk's and Schomberg's landing — or, in other 
words, by the complete defeats of the Orange insurgents by the 
Irish army, with very inferior numbers, at Dromore-Iveagh, the 
passes of the Ban, and at Clady-ford before Derry, and even 
by a fair view of the shamelessly-overrated Williamite defence 
of that place 214 

CHAPTER VII. * 

Privations endured by the Irish army previous to the arrival of 
St. Ruth ; great diminution of the national force through the 
treachery of O'Donnell and other causes ; and a detailed account 
of the campaign down to, and inclusive of, the battle of Augh- 
rim, by way of showing what sort of " had fighting" the Irish 
displayed " at home." 240 

CHAPTER VIII. 

Complete confutation of the notion of the Irish having " fought 
badly at home," by a full expose of what an immense sum it 
took to put them down. Capabilities of Ireland for national or 
self-legislative independence, as contrasted with the native 
strength of Greece in the time of Philip and Alexander, Spain 



CONTENTS. 11 

PAGE 

under Philip II., Holland from the time it threw off the Spanish 
yoke to the French Revolution, Portugal before and after it cast 
off the same yoke, and Prussia down to the French Revolution. 
Concluding induction from the whole of the preceding facts, that 
Ireland is entitled to, would be able to attain, and can only ex- 
pect justice from, a Repeal of the Union 361 

APPENDIX. 

From Taifs Magazine, illustrating, from Scotch testimony, the 
fallacy of asserting that a Union with England, which was so 
good for Scotland, must also be good for Ireland 373 



PEEEACE. 



The following pages contain a few selections in verse 
and prose, the compilation of which was first suggested by 
the casual perusal, during a winter's residence in the coun- 
try, of an allusion, in the Quarterly Review,^ to two po- 
litical and literary Societies, with which the author of this 
volume connected himself, at a period of life, when those 
who have not been under the necessity of adopting a regu- 
lar profession or business devote their time to dissipation or 
intellectual amusement. Of this latter mode of spending 
some hours that might have been worse employed, the 
verses in the work are specimens. A desire of correcting 
the errors in the Quarterly respecting the political objects 
of the Societies alluded to, and the admission by such an 
eminent literary as well as politically-hostile periodical, 
that each of those Societies " exhibited public proofs that 
its labours were not frivolous or unproductive," suggested 
the idea, that a miscellaneous volume, like the present, 
might be of some use, from the light it would throw upon 
one of the most important portions of the agitation of the 
last few years ; even independent of any additional service 
that such a publication might be made capable of rendering 
to the cause of voluntaryism in religion, and self-legislation 
in politics, without which there can neither be true Chris- 
tianity nor real liberty in any country. Till each religion 
is left to support itself, and each nation is left to make laws 
for itself, there can be no such thing as justice ; and there 
should be no such thing as tranquillity. The law, indeed, 
should not be violated ; but it should meet with no more than 
* gee p. Ill, note 3. 
2 



14 PREFACE. 

a mere physical or prudential obedience — while the mind, 
or great primary moving power of the sect or the country 
subjected to such a twofold system of spiritual and tem- 
poral oppression as that of being taxed for another religion 
or legislated for by another nation, should be in a constant 
state of moral insurrection, which, as sure as the soul is 
superior to the body, and justice preferable to injustice, 
must, if only persevered in, be ultimately successful. 

In the postscript to the lines, entitled " Epistle of Dr. 
Southey, Poet Laureate and Author of the Book of the 
Church, to the Editor of the Parson's Horn-Book," an en- 
deavour has been made to demonstrate the moral indefensi- 
bility of all such institutions as state, or forcibly-maintained 
Churches, by a combination of more clear and at the same 
time comprehensive reasons, than have, perhaps, been yet 
presented in so concise a shape. These reasons have been 
prefixed to the account of the Comet Club, as constituting 
the principles on which that body, in the Horn- Book and 
Cornet^ diffused, in 1831, that general spirit of active or 
really working hostility to the Irish Church and tithe-sys- 
tem, which was so long and so formidably successful ; and 
which, though recently reduced to a sort of calm, by a par- 
liamentary arrangement disapproved of by the writer of 
these pages, will, he hopes, never be suffered to expire by 
the friends of Irish liberty, and the admirers of the ecclesi- 
astical system of primitive Christianity, till the complete 
legal extinction, or application to generally-useful purposes, 
of that impost of blood-stained decimation, so long extorted, 
in the insulted name of religion, by the minority from the 
majority, and by the rich from the poor, upon no authority 
more sacred than that of the statute-book, and by no means 
more suitable to the doctrine of " peace on earth" than 
horse, foot, and artillery. In speaking thus, however, the 
author neither is, nor has ever been, actuated by any feel- 
ings of low and illiberal, or mere sectarian prejudice against 
the Church of England, for which, next to his own, or the 



PREFACE. 15 

Catholic Church, he has the greatest respect. Regardmg 
religion as a matter of authority and feeling far more than 
of mere reason, or, more properly speaking, than of that 
which the mass of wrangling dabblers in theology think to 
be reason ; hating polemics, morally, as being more destruc- 
tive to the main test of Christianity, or the general exercise 
of kindness towards one another, than beneficial to any 
particular sect ; detesting spiritual squabbles and the mania 
of proselytism, politically, as being the cause of that dis- 
graceful discord amongst Irishmen, which has led to the 
provincial debasement and consequent misery of their com- 
mon country; and, in fine, having the same aversion to 
wound the mind of another by an attack on his religious 
belief, as to inflict pain on his body by a blow ; the author 
has endeavoured to state his views on the subject of volun- 
taryism, in a manner which he hopes will prove him to 
have been mare qualified for handling such a topic — or 
treating it according to the arguments suitable to persons of 
every religious belief, since all must be afi*ected by the ex- 
istence of such institutions as state-churches — than if he 
were capable of assailing the existing Establishment for the 
mere object of putting another Church into its place. As 
a layman, contented with his own creed, and willing to 
leave others contented with theirs, he cannot accuse himself 
of having been influenced, in any thing he has written, by 
the slightest feeling of bigotry against the Irish established 
clergy, for whom, — drawing a due distinction between the 
men and the system, — he always advocated the payment 
of a life-provision, equal to the value of the ecclesiastical 
income proposed to be taken from them. He is opposed 
to the Establishment solely on moral and political grounds 
— the moraU involving the principle of justice in general, 
as springing from a belief that no one should be forced, 
either in this, or in any other country, to pay for a religion 
from whose doctrines he dissents — the political, including 
the principle of justice in particular, with regard to his own 



16 PREFACE. 

country, as originating in a conviction, that the existence 
of the present, or of any state-connected Church, but espe- 
cially the existence of the present, must be the greatest 
obstacle to the national regeneration of Ireland. Were the 
people of this country not disorganized by sectarian feuds, 
they would be strong enough to effect that regeneration. 
But the State-Church, or politico-religious garrison planted 
by England amongst us, to gain a part of the inhabitants to 
support her unjust ascendency by enabling them to plunder 
and oppress the rest, and to divide all in the name of reli- 
gion, must first be rooted out — for then, and not till then, 
can all sects be perfectly equalized — as such, united among 
themselves — and, as united among themselves, able to re- 
gain that national independence which England, through 
their domestic discord alone, either 2vas able to deprive 
them of, or is able to withhold from them. Till the two 
cats in the fable disagreed about the cheese, the monkey 
was not able to come in and reconcile their differences by 
taking it all to himself. And, if Catholics and Protestants 
were as united in 1800 as in 1782, — which, but for the 
causes of division, springing from the existence of an Es- 
tablished Church, they must have been, — we well know 
what little chance there would have been, of the monkey 
transfer of our domestic legislature to the other side of the 
Channel. 

With respect to the verses at the commencement of the 
volume, the author ventures to hope, that the very small 
proportion which they bear to the rest of the book, and the 
fact of their having been copied, in several instances, by 
others, from the sources through which they originally ap- 
peared in print, may be deemed at least some excuse for 
their being thought worthy of collection in the present 
shape. Even, on such trifles, various opinions will of 
course be formed, though none, he trusts, except as to the 
writer's political principles, from any thing that may appear 
in those few passing effusions, — originating, like all pro- 



PREFACE. 17 

ductions of the kind, from mere impressions and circum- 
stances of the moment, as different at different times as the 
dates of the respective pieces. Thus, it will be seen, as 
well from the date of November, 1836, to the song on the 
Temperance Society, as from the various allusions which it 
contains, that it could not have been the author's design to 
ridicule that great moral reformation produced in the na- 
tional habits by the invaluable exertions of the Rev. Mr. 
Matthew, whose success, in such a noble cause, may be 
regarded by Irishmen as the strongest test, as the surest 
precursor, that still "greater things shall they do." The 
song in question was written at a time when the Tempe- 
rance Societies were looked upon by the author as being 
very little, if any thing better, than insidious confederacies 
of saintly humbug, veiling some plans for tampering with 
the religious belief of the people, under a mere outward 
profession of aiming to ameliorate their condition by the 
destruction of intemperance ; a notion, the more natural on 
the part of the author, from the class of persons to whom 
any participation in those societies was then chiefly, if not 
totally, confined. The revolution which has since taken 
place, and has converted what the writer regarded as a mere 
inroad of the restless spirit of biblical proselytism into a 
grand Irish moral movement, was not foreseen by him at 
the time the verses alluded to were written, nor even when 
they were printed; but, being printed, they had to be left 
where they stood. This, it is hoped, will be a sufficient 
apology for the appearance of those lines. Indeed, of 
teetotalism, amongst those who find by experience that they 
know not w^here to stop, it can hardly be requisite for the 
author to express Ids humble approbation. The system is 
no other than that so long acted upon by Doctor Johnson ; 
a man, whose intellectual and moral eminence would do 
honour to any country and religion. Finding, as we are 
told, that '* he could practise abstinence, but not tempe- 
rance," he became a water-drinker; abstaining, for several 

2* 



i8 PREFACE. 

years, from the use of any intoxicating liquor. And the 
resolution which he found necessary, others, similarly 
affected, may well consider themselves bound to observe.^ 

The critical and historical remarks in the paper on the 
comparative merits of '' David's Lament for Saul and Jona- 
than," and Wolfe's ''Lines on the Burial of Sir John 
Moore," may possess some attraction for those who prefer 
literary to political disquisitions. 

In the postscript to the verses, headed " Nabis and the 
Union," some curious, though hitherto unobserved analo- 
gies between the results of the spirit of Anti-Unionism in 
this country and in Scotland are pointed out, and commented 
upon. A remarkable official testimony is given as to the 
predominance of Anti-Unionism in Ireland over every other 
political feeling. An inquiry, as regards the Tory or 
Chartist idea of maintaining a Union by " physical force," 
is made with respect to the proportion of soldiers and sailors 
contributed by Ireland to the English army and navy since 
the period of the American war. An outline is then drawn 
of her various capabilities for national or self-legislative in- 
dependence, illustrated by a comparison of her superior 
size, in geographical square miles, to that of the greater 
number of the existing states of Europe. A brief survey is 
next taken of the peculiar military strength and defensibility 
of the country against any thing in the shape of a hostile 
invasion. A review follows, of the causes through which 
the various alleged conquests of this country were effected, 
and the price which they cost — this review being more full 
in reference to the great struggle of the Revolution from 
1688 to 1691, so grossly misrepresented to the world, as 
an instance of the Irish having "fought badly at home," by 
those Williamite libellers, who have hitherto been almost 
exclusively cited and believed as authorities on the subject. 
A still further proof is presented of the folly or cowardice 
that would assign this island no higher rank than that of a 
* Boswell's Life, p. 275, 367, 452, &c. Jones's edit. 



PREFACE. 19 

province, by a contrast of her superior resources for poli- 
tical greatness, compared with several of the most eminent 
states in ancient and modern history. A demonstration is 
made of the monstrous pecuniary drain imposed upon Ire- 
land by England, against the terms, as well as through the 
medium, of the so-called Act of Union ; and the essay con- 
cludes with a glance at what the author considers must be 
the finally separate destiny of the two islands, unless the 
unjust, ruinous, and intolerable usurpation by England of 
the national rights of Ireland, through the nefarious job of a 
bribed, anti-national legislature, shall be surrendered, — if 
not from motives of political honesty or common justice, 
yet from the prudential considerations involved with the 
fact, of two-thirds of the English military force being na- 
tives of the same insular territory of 32,201 square miles, 
which presents a recruiting population of 2,000,000 more 
at home, — at once becoming more numerous, and, from the 
present system of the connexion between their country with 
England, more discontented, every day. 

The observations on our military History — made for the 
purpose of testing, in the most conclusive way, the truth of 
the assertion as to our having " always fought badly at 
home," by examining how much time and money our prin- 
cipal wars with England cost, even disunited as we were, — 
have been included in this volume by the advice of a literary 
friend, who was of opinion, that the number o{ facts, and 
reasonings, founded on facts contained in those remarks — 
mere mems. loosely thrown together as they are, — more 
fully refute the above-mentioned discreditable notion, and 
place many circumstances of the great war of the Revolu- 
tion between King James and the Prince of Orange in a 
more honourable light for the country than has yet been 
done by any Irish writer. That some of those mems. on 
the subject of that war, though intended to correct the faults 
of other writers, might be considerably improved, is freely 



20 PREFACE. 

admitted.^ For, amidst the great difficulty of gaining an 
admittance to so many documents as it is absolutely neces- 
sary to consult, in order to form more than a superficial 
opinion on almost any point of such a " vexato questio^^ 
as our modern story, in which the unscrupulous malignity 
of a hostile sect and country has been almost the exclusive 
source of any intelligence as to details, and has been as in- 
dustrious as it has been determined to misrepresent an ob- 
noxious religion and injured nation in almost every parti- 
cular, who could see his way to more than a portion of truth 
at a time ? This remark is more particularly applicable to 
some of those observations in reference to King James, that 
have been made under the influence of the ideas generally 
entertained of him, through the accounts of his enemies ; 
ideas, from which nothing but a long, laborious, and difficult 
acquaintance with the scattered and scarce records, to which 
access must be obtained in order to form a true conception 
of his conduct, and a full exposition of the varied, curious 

* Thus, in page 225-6, for " the loss of the besieged/' at Derry, 
"behig, according to Walker, about 3,200 men," should be substituted 
" the loss of the regimented garrison — the whole of those who perished 
DURING the Irish blockade, or without including any who died from its 
effects AFTER the place was relieved, being estimated, on Williamite au- 
thority, at no less than 10,000 !" Again, the full complement of fighting 
men in the town, which the Duke of Berwick merely speaks of as 
"above 10,000," is made 2,000 more, or 12,000 in all, by a contempo- 
rary Protestant authority. The calculation, too, at p. 285-9, from a 
passage in Story, of Ginckle's battering train before Athlone, at but 29 
cannon and 6 mortars, is to be corrected by the testimony of one of his 
own officers, (whose word could not be consulted when the above 
calculation was made,) into " 50 battering cannon and 8 mortars ; so 
that the Dutch general, with his 12 field-pieces, had 70 guns there — a 
statement by which the " 47 guns and mortars," (inclusive of field-pieces) 
at p. 274, may likewise be altered. The Dutch list, also, of William's 
foot regiments in Ireland, in 1691, makes them, with the exception of the 
Danes, 780, instead of 705 men each ; which would add considerably 
to the amount of Ginckle's army at Aughrim. Such particulars, however, 
only serve to show, that, unlike the Williamite defamers of Ireland, 
(who, by the way, are as remarkable for virulent and unscrupulous mis- 
representation as any Jacobite or Irish accounts we have are for an ad- 
herence to truth,) the author has kept considerably within, rather than 
gone beyond, what facts would justify, in his criticisms on those li- 
bellers. 



PREFACE. 



21 



and interesting information thus acquired, in the shape of a 
complete Irish history of the Revolution of 1688-91, can 
be sufficient to disabuse the public mind. To that rare, and 
highly interesting knowledge as regards Ireland, and indeed 
England too, as connected with Ireland, the observations 
under consideration have been the means of leading their 
author, and of thus far more than compensating lihn for any 
defects which they contain. In proof of this, he adduces 
the narrative he has given of the battle of Aughrim, which, 
though by no means containing all he could cite on the sub- 
ject — for why should he enable others to trace out and 
trade upon that for which he alone has laboured ? — will, he 
thinks, prove him to be acquainted with a much greater 
number of printed, manuscript, and traditional authorities 
respecting that important event, and the remarkable period 
with which it is connected, than can be obtained from any of 
the wretched productions called Irish histories, that have 
purported to give an account of those times. His peculiar 
sources of research — exclusive of a familiar acquaintance 
with all the common writers on the subject — consist of se- 
veral large volumes of the MS. of King William's Secre- 
tary, and similar folios of the War correspondence between 
General Ginckle, his Officers, the Castle, and Whitehall ; 
of a still more valuable collection of the original proclama- 
tions of King James and his government in this country — 
the more curious, from the great care that was taken to se- 
crete or destroy every document of his administration, and 
then to assail him, and the Irish clergy and people as his 
supporters, with the most disgusting misrepresentations ; of 
an acquaintance -with nearly all the Continental writers who 
have touched upon the wars of this country at the Revolu- 
tion ; of a perusal of, and extracts from, the greater portion 
of the numerous pamphlets and other periodicals of the 
time that were printed in English, — including some very 
interesting tracts in favour of King James, and the Duke of 
Tyrconnell, not even alluded to by those who have hitherto 



22 PREFACE. 

written histories of the Revolution. In addition to this ex- 
tensive and authentic mass of documents on the subject, he 
can obtain access to several hundred letters of King James's 
Secretary, from which sufficient extracts can soon be made, 
and with these, and an inspection of some valuable docu- 
ments in Paris, which can also be quickly read through, 
and extracted from, as what they are, and where they are 
to be found, are known, the writer, if encouraged, would un- 
dertake a History of the Revolution and war in Ireland from 
1688 to 1691-- followed by an account of the Irish in all the 
foreign services, from the termination of O'Neill's war with 
Elizabeth, when our countrymen first entered these services 
in considerable numbers, down to the present times ; and 
the whole concluding with an inquiry into what portion the 
Irish have formed of that army and navy, which Tory 
swaggering would threaten this country with, under the 
usurped name of" the British heart and the British arm." 
A work of this kind would, it is scarcely necessary to 
say, be one of the highest interest and utility — fortified, as 
it would be, (according to the plan proposed and roughly 
exemplified in this volume,) with copious notes, contain- 
ing minute comparisons of, and references to, authorities, 
corroborative extracts from scarce or MS. documents, arith- 
metical analyses and tables of the numbers of the Irish and 
English forces in every important action, and accounts of 
old families, both Irish and English, that took a part in the 
Revolution of this country — and written, as the work would 
be, not from the evidences of one side, or rather from a 
mere portion of those evidences, as all our superficial com- 
pilations on the subject at present are, but, as far as possi- 
ble, from all the documents known to exist, as well on the 
side of William, as of his unfortunate father-in-law. To 
see whether his countrymen would wish to encourage an 
undertaking, that would be the means of vindicating the 
calumniated military character of their ancestors in the great 
contest adverted to, and of raising that three years' me- 



PREFACE. 23 

morable struggle of *' the truest, the last of the brave," for 
their persecuted country and religion, into at least something 
like the honourable position which such bravery and fidelity 
as theirs ought to occupy on the page of history, has been 
the cause that this volume has been allowed to expand so 
much beyond what was the original intention of the author. 
For his own part, whatever may be the reception of those 
miscellaneous sheets, and of the proposal which they con- 
tain, their compilation, in the present shape, will always be 
to him a source of the highest gratification, as having been 
the means of leading him into a mass of knowledge on the 
subject in question, so far beyond what he had any idea of 
when he first thought of criticising the usual Williamite 
accounts of that war, that, between what he has made out 
and transcribed, and what he knows where to get, he may 
confidently affirm that he has the materials for giving a far 
better account than has yet appeared of the events of that 
memorable era in our modern annals, and of the achieve- 
ments of the Irish in the services of the great powers of the 
Continent, which he would combine with its history. To 
him, as one of the race, both in blood and feeling, to which 
eight-tenths of the men belonged, who "filled the ranks 
and fed the cannon" in the cause of their country, religion, 
and legitimate Sovereign, and whose gallantry procured 
that celebrated treaty, the nefarious violation of which has 
been perpetuated to, and is a primary cause of, the agitation 
of the present times, a minute research into the details of 
such a contest did not appear a matter of indifference, and 
was not felt to be a source of weariness, notwithstanding" 
the great labour of transcription, as well as of study attend- 
ant upon such an inquiry. And though he may be taxed 
with too much enthusiasm on the subject, — for of merely 
interested motives he can scarcely be accused, as he does 
not live by writing, — he thinks, that the execution of such 
a work as has been proposed ought to be looked upon in 
much the same light by his countrymen as by himself. 



24 PREFACE. 

Should this be their as well as his opinion, the portraits of 
Eichard Talbot, Duke of Tyrconnell, and Patrick Sarsfield, 
Earl of Lucan, will indeed be evidences of the spirit in 
which the work shall be written. But, to guard, as much 
as possible, against the influence of prejudice, and the 
charge of partiality, comparisons of the difl'erent accounts 
of every important transaction, by both domestic and foreign 
writers, shall be given in notes, minutely specifying every 
authority, and stating, when any work is rare, in what 
library, and where in that library, it can be procured. The 
notes in this volume, — modified, of course, to suit the 
calmer tone of a regular history, — will convey a general 
idea of that portion of the writer's plan ; his object being, 
by such notes, and appendices, to make the work contain 
every thing worth knowing on the subject. Except where 
it may be necessary to pronounce his own opinion on any 
point, his narrative shall receive no colouring, unless what 
can be justified either by the testimony of ofiicial and con- 
temporary, or of such statements as may appear to have 
been derived from official and contemporary sources of in- 
formation. Appropriate and decisive quotations, similar to 
those in the sketch of the siege of Athlone and battle of 
Aughrim, — given in this volume as rough specimens of the 
proposed narrative, — shall be introduced, as often as possi- 
ble, into the text ; the author having the greatest contempt 
for that impertinent obtrusion of dogmatizing vanity, called 
the '* philosophy of history," or for any mode of writing 
history, but one based upon an honest, industrious search 
for, and a patient weaving together of, the best original tes- 
timonies on the subject; whose very words, as superior to 
any others in point of credit, and as generally the most 
picturesque, — from the greater liveliness with which we 
will speak of what we have seen, than of what we have 
heard, — should constantly, but especially in the account of 
any important matter, be laid before a reader. 

From a book so written, on the only war deserving the 



PREFACE. 25 

appellation of national that can be said to have taken place 
between this country and England,* and one not of so re- 
mote a date as to be uninteresting now, since there are 
several persons in existence that might have conversed 
with those who actually lived at the time,t and the present 

• By this is meant, the only war in which Ireland had any thing like 
a resident Sovereign, with a national government, and a united popula- 
tion, in contending against England — which, as contrasted with her 
other struggles, she had, or, allowing for the defection of Ulster, was 
nearest having, in James's time. The Irish, indeed, knew this well, and 
showed that they knew it ; if it were only by the spirit-stirring inscrip- 
tion, in large letters, on the great standard, which was kept flying at the 
top of the Castle, where the King was — 

" Now OR NEVER ! 

Now AXD FOR EVER !" 

•j- The Duke of Wellington, for example, who was born in 1769, 
might not only have spoken to several persons contemporary with the 
Revolution, but to one who not only witnessed that but a still earlier, 
and not less remarkable contest, in this country. Thus, in 1773, Charles 
MTindley, Esq., of the County Tipperary, died, aged 143 years; having 
been a captain under Charles I., and having come over to Ireland, in 
1649, with Cromwell; shortly after which he quitted the army. In 
March, 1774, died at Dungiven, County Londonderry, William Beatty, 
Esq., who bore a pair of colours at the Boyne and Aughrim. In November, 
1776, Alderman William Owagan, senior Alderman of Cork, died there, 
aged 93 ; having acted as a page to James II., in 1689, when the King 
was publicly entertained by that city, on his landing from France. In 
1784, there were, in Armagh, a very old man, a beggar, and a still 
older beggar-woman, who are spoken of, by one who knew them both, 
as constant quarrellers about the Irish politics of the preceding cen- 
tury ; the old man having marched, under King James, through Ar- 
magh, in 1689, in the Irish advance against Derry, and having been 
present, the following year, at the Boyne ; and the old woman, who 
lived to 140, having been wife to a soldier who also fought there, but 
on WilUam's side. In January, 1 792, Thomas Wimms, who served at 
the siege of Londonderry, died in Tuam, at the age of 117, In May, 
1794, a man named Conolly died, aged 118, near Edenderry, King's 
County, " who," says the account, " perfectly remembered the landing 
of King James and the Prince of Orange, the sieges of Derry and 
Limerick, the battles of the Boyne and Aughrim, and every other me- 
morable occurrence of those times !" About the end of 1796, a gentle- 
man, now between 60 and 70, (and a friend of the writer,) happening 
to stop on horseback with his father between Killmastulla and Bird 
Hill, in the County Tipperary, an extremely venerable old man came 
out of a cabin to hold the horses, and being asked, how old he was 1 
replied — " Sir, I don't know ; but, when I was very young, I served as 
a soldier in King James's army !" In fine, so late as the same year, 

3 



26 PREFACE. 

liberal government, and its supporters, the people of Ire- 
land, are only now effectually pulling down the Williamite 
oligarchy, that owed its ascendancy to the events of that 
period — from such a book much benefit might be derived, 
through the instructive view it would give of the great 
amount of time, labour, blood, and money, that had to be 
expended, for the elevation of the tyranny of a faction, at 
the expense of the rights of a nation ; through the notion 
it would convey, of how very different, in all human proba- 
bility, would be the result of such another contest between 
the two islands, as certain manoeuvres of the Sellis-Garth 
despot of Hanover, and his Williamite supporters, inight 
have but recently occasioned ; and " above all, and before 
all," through the spectacle it would afford to the world, of 
a greater mass of low and shameless misrepresentation, 
directed against this country and its religion, by English 
and Anglo-Irish malignity, intolerance, and oppression, 
than the character, principles, and conduct of any one 
nation have, perhaps, ever met with, in history, from the 
writers of another. 

Yet, on such libellers alone, have we hitherto been left 
to depend for any history of the important war and revolu- 
tion in question; a circumstance, as the writer of these 
remarks believes, not less conducive to the political degra- 
dation, than to the national dishonour, of his country — since, 
it is, in a very great degree, through the grossly exaggerated 
descriptions of the conduct of the Roman Catholics to the 
Protestants of Ireland, while the former held power under 
James II., that the antinational scribes alluded to, and their 
patrons, for their own selfish and intolerant supremacy 
alone, have been able to keep Protestant and Catholic dis- 

1796, the Recorder of Drogheda, who presented the address from that 
town to James II., in 1689, on his march against Marshal Schomberg, 
was still living ; being certainly not less than between 130 and 140 
years old. From private information, and the periodical publications of 
the last century, several more instances of the kind could be given ; but 
these will suffice. 



PREFACE. 27 

united, to the loss of almost every thing politically honour- 
able and valuable to them as Irishmen ; the constant and 
interested propagation of the calumny, that the Irish 
*' always fought," and, by implication, would again ''fight 
badly at home," being resorted to, as the best method, along 
with the suppression or discouragement of all but com- 
pletely partial or one-sided testimony on the subject, to 
keep an oppressed people quiet, under such a system. 
While the details of the war of the Revolution were still 
fresh in the memory of numbers of Irish as well as of Wil- 
liamite participators in the contest, the monopoly of all 
power at home by the Anglo-Orange or penal-code party, 
who would be so very unlikely to tolerate the publication 
of any accounts of that w^ar but their own, and the general 
impoverishment and depression of those, who, under other 
circumstances, would have patronised an Irish account of 
the struggle, rendered any undertaking of the kind, at once 
too dangerous and too unprofitable to be ventured upon, in 
the country which was the scene of the events in question ; 
and such of the Irish of rank and education as went to the 
Continent, with the national army, after the Treaty of Li- 
merick, and were qualified, by what they knew, to do jus- 
tice to their countrymen's defence of James's cause, would 
be incapacitated from such a task, either by their constant 
military service in those warlike times, by the wounds or 
ill health occasioned by such service, or by their death, in 
the performance of their duty, before they could put such 
a design in execution. Even MacGeoghegan, who had 
sufficient authorities, in his time, for giving a far better 
account than he has done of the war of the Revolution, is 
miserably concise and superficial ; and, to the very small 
stock of information, on the Irish side, which he has given, 
no other Irish writer has added any thing worth mention- 
ing. Thus a clear field has hitherto been left to the Eng- 
lish and Orange enemies of Ireland, to give what versions 
they chose of the conduct of the Irish people in that war ; 



28 PREFACE. 

an advantage, which those writers have availed themselves 
of in such a manner as to provoke, in the strictures on their 
libels in the following pages, a degree of asperity on the 
part of the writer, which, however natural in him, as one 
of the race and religion so vilified, would be calculated to 
give an unfavourable impression of any thing in the shape 
of a history that might emanate from him, if he were not 
determined, in the composition of such a work, — or of one, 
so very different, in its nature, from the present ephemeral 
production, — to deprive himself, in a manner, of the capa- 
bility of being partial, by keeping his political feelings under 
such a strong check of minute references and constant quo- 
tations, as to confine the influence of those feelings to the 
narrowest possible limits. The design of this history of 
the Revolution, and of the Irish in the Continental services, 
is announced in the prefatory remarks to this miscellaneous 
volume, since it was the casual circumstance of its compila- 
tion that led the author to the knowledge and acquisition 
of that large and valuable quantity of materials, foreign as 
well as domestic, which, on the plan he has laid down for 
writing such a work, should, he thinks, render it not un- 
worthy of the notice and encouragement of Irishmen. His 
reason for making this appeal to the spirit of literary nation- 
ality amongst his countrymen — if any such exists — is, 
that, though independent of the public as an individual, the 
expense of getting out such a book, on the only principle 
to which he would accede, or that of publishing it in Ire- 
land, would be too much for his private resources. He 
would not wish, that a work, purposely written to vindicate 
the most important part of the character, or, in other words, 
the military honour of the nation, should be at all identified 
with that most degrading of all signs of submission to a 
foreign yoke, or the miserable subserviency of mind, which 
would enslave this country, not only in a political but a 
literary sense, by making it necessary to have the stamp 
of a London publisher's name affixed to an Irish book, as 



PREFACE. 29 

well as the consent of a London parliament to an Irish law. 
He would have Irish manufacture connected with informa- 
tion for the mind, as well as with clothing for the body — 
for which reason he would not print or publish the present 
volume out of his native city, notwithstanding the contrary 
practice of printing and publishing in London. If the book 
shall be deemed worthy of any attention, he would wish it 
to be that of Irishmen. If it shall not be deemed worthy 
of such notice, he will at least have the satisfaction of having 
spent what it cost him in his own^ instead of another country. 
It may be requisite to state, that a considerable portion 
of the remarks on the war of the Revolution were written 
and printed off, at a period when the author had not pro- 
cured access to several valuable literary collections, to which 
he subsequently got admission. Among these last, was the 
library of Trinity College, where, it would be ungrateful in 
him not to acknowledge, that he obtained every facility for 
prosecuting his researches, which could be expected from 
the politeness of gentlemen, and the liberality of scholars. 
Whatever may have been the spirit of exclusiveness for- 
merly existing amongst those connected with that institu- 
tion, he experienced none of the obstacles which were once 
presented to the inquiries of the man of letters ; while it 
gives him still greater pleasure than could be conferred by 
any favour he experienced, to be able to state, that, chiefly 
owing to the laudable interest taken in ancient Irish learning 
by the librarian, Doctor Todd, a society has been set on 
foot, on a principle similar to that of the Oriental Transla- 
tion Fund Society in London, to give the world the benefit 
of the valuable and curious collections of native Irish litera- 
ture in the archives of the University — each work issued 
by the society to contain both the original Irish text, and an 
exact translation of it in English. Such undertakings, in 
an intelligent age, must always be more productive of ho- 
nour to an institution like the University than any peculiar 
credit it may have been instituted to uphold. The liberal 

3* 



30 PREFACE 

Protestant, who disagrees with, or is indifferent to, the reli 
gious tenets of the Benedictines and the Jesuits, is grateful 
to their memory for their many profound and interesting 
additions to general knowledge ; and the learned Catholic, 
dismissing or forgetting the idea of any difference of creed 
existing between himself and the University, may, in like 
manner, at a future period, be able to say — **At all events, 
that College deserves the praise of rescuing our old national 
literature from oblivion or obscurity!" Such pursuits, in 
their grand and expansive results, when compared with the 
insignificant and narrow squabbles of partisan theology, are 
calculated to put one in mind of Alexander the Great's ob- 
servation, after the battle of Arbela, when, on receiving a 
despatch from his viceroy Antipater announcing the defeat 
and destruction of a few thousand Lacedaemonians in 
Greece, and on contrasting that petty circumstance with the 
immense glory and importance of the battle which had just 
gained him the empire of Asia, he contemptuously exclaimed 
— " I hear there has been a battle of mice in Arcadia 1" 

With respect to some expressions upon the Union, 
speaking of that measure, as if an English or provincializ- 
ing government might be able to compensate this country 
for the loss of her legislative independence, the writer may 
be permitted to state, that those observations were made 
from a wish to avoid interrupting the chance of any benefi- 
cial measure of secondary utility likely to result from the 
truce on the subject of Repeal, then existing between the 
Whig administration and the Repealers, but not from the 
slightest idea, on his part, that Ireland and Irishmen can 
ever be *' as they ought to be," till ''Irish laws alone shall 
Ireland bind" — with the crown existing, as "the only state- 
bond of each island." 

In conclusion, the author ventures to hope — he trusts 
without much presumption — that, whatever may be the 
literary merits of this, miscellany, it will not be devoid of 
some interest in a political, and of even some use in an 
historical, point of view. 



GLEANINGS 



FHOM 



A WHITING-DESK. 



I SAW THEE— TIME'S RUDE HAND HAD DIMMED. 



"Til not leave thee, thou lone one." — Moore. 



I. 

I SAW thee — Time's rude hand had dimmed the lines that 

Beauty traced ; 
And Fortune's frowns and blighting Grief thy rosy prime 

effaced ; 
But, though the noon-day beams that played around thy 

brow were set, 
Like clouds at eve, thy looks retained a tender lustre yet. 

II. 

We spoke — I found thee more than all even Fancy e'er de- 
signed. 
In feelings gentle, pure in taste, in sentiment refined — 
Thy balmy words shed manna o'er the desert of my soul; 
My hours with thee as brightly passed as sunny rivers roll. 

III. 

And art thou, like the wanderer wrecked upon his lonely 

isle, 
W^ith none to weep when thou wouldst weep or gladden at 

thy smile ? 
And shall that Eden heart, where Love might build his 

sweetest shrine. 
Be left amid a dreary world in solitude to pine ? 



36 THE GREEN BOOK. 

IV. 

Oh no ! there is one faithful bosom warmly beats for thee ! 
The cold neglect which thou hast felt endears thee more to 

me ; 
For, though in summer hours of bliss the heart is lured to 

roam, 
'Tis winter's chilling blasts that serve to bind us most to 

home. 
July 1th, 1829. 



THE DEFEAT OF SISERA. 



** The children of Israel again did evil in the sight of the Lord .... 
and the Lord sold them into the hand of Jabin, king of Canaan, that 

reigned in Hazor ; the captain of whose host was Sisera And 

the children of Israel cried unto the Lord ; for he (Sisera) had 900 cha- 
riots of iron, and 20 years he mightily oppressed the children of Israel. 
.... And the Lord discomfited Sisera, and all his chariots, and all his 

host And the hand of the children of Israel prospered, .... 

until they had destroyed Jabin, king of Canaan." Judges, chap, iv. 
V. 1, 2, 3, 16, 23, 24. 

I. 

Strike ! strike the loud harp to the praise of the Lord, 
And, on cymbals of gladness, his glory record! 
Exult ! — for the sceptre of Jabin is broke. 
And Israel is freed from the Canaanites' yoke ! 

II. 

O'er Tabor's wide plains, on Megiddo's green banks, 
The Canaanite marshalled his numberless ranks ;^ 
Like the fiend of the desert, in whirlwinds of flame, 
Breathing death and destruction to Israel they came. 

III. 

When the shrieks of the night-tempest, echoing around, 
Through the hundred dark caves of the mountain resound ; 

' " Hath not the Lord God of Israel commanded, saying, " Go and 

draw toward Mount Tabor]" "The kings came and fought 

by the waters of Megiddo." Judges iv. 6 and 9. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 37 

Hast thou seen the blue lightning, flash darting on flash ? 
Hast thou heard the deep thunder, crash bursting on 
crash ? 

IV. 

As brightly the Canaanites' helmets and shields, 
In the blaze of the morning illumined the fields ; 
As loudly the chargers of Sisera pranced, 
When his chariots to combat with Israel advanced. 

V. 

But where are the helmets, and where are the shields, 
Whose blaze in the morning illumined the fields ? 
And where are the steeds that so haughtily pranced. 
When Sisera's chariots to combat advanced ? 

VI. 

Their splendour is dimmed in the blood of the slain — 
They are rolling iv Kishon's red tide to the main — 
For the feast of the vulture in Taanach is spread. 
And the kings of Canaan are strewed with the dead.^ 

VH. 

The mother of Sisera looks out on high 

From the halls of her palace, for evening is nigh ; 

And the wine-cup is brimmed, and the bright torches burn. 

And the banquet is piled, for the chieftain's return. 

VHI. 

She cries to her maidens, — '' Why comes not my son ? 
Is the combat not o'er, and the battle not won ? 
The steeds of Canaan are many and strong — 
Why tarry the wheels of his chariot so long ?" 

IX. 

She saith in her heart, yea, her wise maidens say, — 

'' He taketh the spoil, he divideth the prey ; 

He seizeth the garment of glittering dyes. 

And maketh the daughters of Beauty his prize !"^ 

^ " Then fought the kings of Canaan in Taanach The 

river of Kishon swept them away." Judges, v. 19, 21. 

2 "The mother of Sisera looked out at a window, and cried through 
the lattice, ' Why is his chariot so long in coming ] why tarry the 



38 THE GREEN BOOK. 

X. 

But Sisera's mother shall view him no more ; 
With the warriors of Hazor he sleeps in his gore ; 
And the bear and the lion his coursers consume ; 
And the beak of the eagle is digging his tomb. 

XI. 

And the owl and the raven are flapping their wings ; 
And their death-song is heard in the chambers of kings ; 
For the sword of the Lord and of Israel lowers 
O'er Sisera's palace, and Jabin's proud towers. 
Nov. I3th, 1831. 



EPIGRAM. 

On the weeping and laughing philosophers. 



Que vois-je 1 la discorde au milieu de ces 
Et de maitres, entr'eux sans cesse di vises, 
Naissent des spectateurs I'un a I'autre opposes. 
Nos folles vanites font pleurer Heraclite ; 
Ces memes vanites font rire Democrite. 

Racine. 



''If we look," says Racine, "to the lives of the wise, 

What opposite maxims we find ! — 
Here sad Heraclitus despondingly cries. 

While Democritus laughs at mankind !" 
But, as long as my stay in this planet extends, 

To follow them both I propose — 
With one, — may I weep for my suff'ering friends, 

With the other, — I'll laugh at my foes. 

wheels of his chariots V Her wise ladies answered her, yea, she returned 
answer to herself, — ' Have they not sped ? have they not divided the 
prey ] to every man a damsel or two ; to Sisera a prey of divers colours 

meet for the necks of them that take the spoil.' '* — Judges v. 

28, 29, 30. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 39 

THE TEMPERANCE SOCIETY. 

A SONG. 

Air — "J. captain bold of Halifax once lived in country quarters.^'' 



I. 

We live in times when ev'ry fool has plans to mend the nation ; 
We've bibles, paper-banks^ and rules for checking popu- 
lation ; 
But, though of humbugs now-a-days we've such a grand 

variety, 
The primest of all humbugs is — the Temperance Society. 
Oh ! what a gag is the Temperance Society ! 
Oh! what a gag is the Temperance Society 1^ 

II. 

The leader of this holy hoax is Mr. Justice **>!^**^'^*, 
Whom something, at Dungarvan, that I need not tell, was 

stampt on,^ 
But, wasn't it a shame for Dan to give such notoriety 
To that charge against a patron of — the Temperance Society ? 

Oh! what a gag is the Temperance Society ! 

Oh ! what a gag is the Temperance Society ! 

III. 

The rack-rentinof landlord, who in abundance riots. 
While on water and potatoes his tenantry he diets. 
Maintains the poor would be from all causes for disquiet free, 
If they only would belong to the Temperance Society ! 

Oh ! what a gag is the Temperance Society ! 

Oh ! what a gag is the Temperance Society ! 

' An allusion to the rage for banking speculations, and to the stopping 
of the Agricultural Bank, in Dublin, about the time those lines were 
written. 

2 If the happy bucks, or " decided enemies of care," amongst whom 
this song may be sung, shall be in due spirits ^ or wine, or spirits of 
wine, or wine and spirits, then " oh ! what a gag," &c., may be repeated 
in a full chorus of roaring glory. — Note of the Author for the Critics 
and the Saints. 

3 See the "stolen or strayed" epistles, of a semi-official, semi- Galwa- 
gian description, that were intended "/o make Dungarvan shake,''' but 
only contributed to drum the Grey ministry out of power to the tune of 
*^The rogues^ march.''' 



40 THE GREEN BOOK. 

IV. 

The Parson finding now, that all chance of tithe is failing, 
As passively resisting makes the bay'net unavailing, 
Becomes, since he can't help it, quite a model of sobriety, 
And, for want of cash and claret, joins — the Temperance 
Society ! 

Oh ! what a gag is the Temperance Society ! 
Oh ! what a gag is the Temperance Society ! 

V. 

The saintly old maid who in private is so handy 

At warming her devotion with cups of tea — half brandy! 

Lest folks should think her nose too red for one of so much 

piety. 
Is seen at all the meetings of — the Temperance Society ! 

Oh ! what a gag is the Temperance Society ! 

Oh ! what a gag is the Temperance Society ! 

VI. 

So push the bottle on, my friends, and may we long be able 
To meet, as we are met to-night, around this happy table ; 
And, while in brimming bowls we sink all trouble and 

anxiety. 
We'll laugh at holy twaddle and — the Temperance Society. 
Oh ! what a gag is the Temperance Society ! 
Oh ! what a gag is the Temperance Society ! 
November, 1836. 



ORRAR AND MUIRNE. 
[From the Irish.] 

1. 

She comes along the flowery lawn — 
Joy sparkles in her dewy glance ; 

And, in the fanning breath of dawn. 
Her jetty locks in ringlets dance. 

Less lovely, from his orient tower. 
The sun o'er bright Bin-Edur^ glows ; 

' Bin-Edur — the ancient name of the Hill of Howth. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 41 

Less welcome falls the pearly shower 
That wakes to life the fainting rose, 
Than thou, enchanting Muirne ! art 
To cheer thine Orrar's throbbing heart. 

2. 

Ere yet my youthful arm could wave 

The glittering sword in fields of fight; 
When tuneful baids to glory gave 

The deeds of Erin's matchless might ; 
My bosom thrilled with Valour's flame. 

Inspired by Music's kindling power ; 
I sighed to hear my father's fame, 

And burned for battle's fiercest hour ; 
But Muirne ! then^ I ne'er had viewed 
That form which since my soul subdued. 



Yet Muirne ! oft has Orrar sought 

His country's foes — nor sought in vain ; 
Where'er this hand th' invader fought, 

His bravest, mightiest, strewed the plain, 
But never has my conquering spear 

Against the feeble aimed a blow. 
Nor, when disarmed and pale with fear, 

Has laid th' imploring warrior low. 
Sunbeam of life to Orrar's breast ! 
Then calm his tender fears to rest. 



Sweet flower of blooming loveliness ! 

Fair-bosomed swan of Beauty hear 1 
And, with one winning smile, confess, 

That Orrar's strains can please thine ear. 
Ah! see that fondly beaming smile 

Bright with young Passion's gentle fire ! 
Yes, those dear looks no more beguile, — 

That glance invites my soul's desire ! 
The rosy flush that lights thy cheeks, 
The dawn of Orrar's bliss bespeaks ! 
Sept 1th, 1833. 

4 



42 THE GREEN BOOK. 

EPIGRAM 
ON A WEALTHY AND PRESUMING UPSTART. 



** There is not, in the whole compass of nature, a more insufferable 
creature than a prosperous fool/' — Cicero. 



When I meet Tom, the purse-proud and impudent block- 
head, 

In his person, the poets' three ages I trace ; 
For the gold and the silver unite in his pocket, 

And the brazen is easily seen in his yhce. 

Feh leth, 1830. 



EPISTLE 

FROM DR. SOUTHEY, POET LAUREAT, AND AUTHOR OF THE " BOOK 



TO THE EDITOR OF THE " PARSON S HORN BOOK 



"t 



Sir, 

I suppose you'll feel somewhat surprised. 
By a mere stranger to be thus advised ; 
But if you wish as well your own salvation, 
As that of Ireland and her "sister nation," 
No longer seek, with satire to destroy. 
But, in the Church's cause, your pen employ ; 
Since, as I'll show, none like her qualifies 
The souls of sinful laymen for the skies. 

When the great author of eternal life 
Shared our afflictions in this ''vale of strife," 
Saint Matthew tells us that a certain Jew 
Asked, " what, to gain salvation, he should do ?" 
"Keep the commandments," the Redeemer cried : 
".y^//, from my youth, Fve kept," the Jew replied. 

» For an account, and examination of the causes that led to the ap- 
pearance, of this first effective publication against Irish Church tempo- 
ralities and abuses, and its connexion with the formation of the "Comet 
Club," and the " Irish Brigade," see the Postcript or Appendix to this 
Epistle, at the end of the volume 



THE GREEN BOOK. 43 

Our Lord rejoined, " If thou wouldst Heaven insure, 
Sell what thou hast, and give it to the poor !" 
But the young man, not liking what he heard. 
His treasures here, to those above, preferred. 
" Then," said our Saviour, '' it is hardly given. 
That a rich man should ever enter heaven ; 
A camel may pass through a needle's eye. 
Ere such a man shall dwell with me on high." 
In the Epistles, too, we find St. Paul, 
Gold, by the name of "filthy lucre," call ; 
And Christ declared " his paths could ne'er be trod 
By those with Mammon seeking to join God." 
Now, Sir, as no one knows these sayings better 
Than Parsons who quote Scripture to the letter. 
They fear, if we possessed the ''root of evil," 
Our wicked hearts would lead us to the devil ; 
And, therefore^ wish to guard us from the curses 
Pronounced on those enjoying ponderous purses. 
For this great end, inspired by holy zeal, 
With the keen shears of leo^islative steel. 
From their dear sheep they clip away the gold. 
As the famed Colchian ram v^di^ fleeced of old — 
Thus nobly making certain our salvation. 
By taking on themselves their flocks^ damnation ! 
Oh, generous men ! no more let Heathen Rome 
To match her blighted fame with yours presume ! 
No more extol her champion Decius Mus^ — 
He died for her — you damn yourselves for us ! 
No more, oh Carthage ! thy Philaeni^ boast. 
Interred alive upon Cyrene's coast; 

' " Decius Mus, a Roman consul, who, after many glorious exploits, 
devoted himself to the gods, manes, for the safety of his country, in 
a battle against the Latins, 338 years B. C. His son Decius, fol- 
lowed his example, fighting against the Gauls and Samnites, B. C. 296. 

This act of devoting one's self was of infinite service to the 

STATE. — Lempriere, 

2 Two Carthaginian brothers, justly celebrated for their patriotism. — 
The Carthaginians and Cyrenseans, after a long and bloody war about 
the limits of their territories, being apprehensive that a third power might 
arise to avail itself of their mutual weakness by the injury or ruin of both, 
agreed to make peace on the following conditions. The two states were 
each to appoint ambassadors, who were to advance in a given direction 
from their respective capitals, at a certain day and hour, and the place 
of their meeting was to be the boundary of their governments. Two 



44 THE GREEN BOOK. 

They, for thy welfare, met a living grave — 
Parsons, for ?/5, eternal torments brave ! 
Did Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, 
In Babylon, such self-devotion show 1 

brothers, the Philaeni, were named as the Carthaginian ambassadors, and, 
either from the remissness of the Cyrenaean envoys, or their liaving been 
delayed by one of those formidable sand-storms, which, in the desert 
parts of Africa, are as dangerous to travellers on land as tempests are 
to mariners at sea, the Carthaginians met their opponents somewhat 
within the Cyrensean limits. The Cyrenseans, being consequently afraid 
of punishment, if they returned home defeated by their own acknow- 
ledgment, endeavoured to involve matters in clamour and confusion, that 
they might escape an impeachment by a rupture of negotiations and a 
renewal of the war. For this purpose, they exclaimed against the Phi- 
Isni as having commenced their journey too soon ; and, on the two 
brothers having honourably offered, for the sake of peace, to waive the 
advantage they had acquired, and to accept of any other terms consistent 
with equality and justice, the Cyrenseans proposed — "Either that the 
Philaeni should consent to be buried alive on the spot claimed by them 
as the boundary of the Carthaginian state, or that they, the Cyrensean 
ambassadors, should be permitted to advance as far as they might choose, 
under the same penalty." The first of these proposals, it was anticipated, 
that the Philaeni, from the penalty annexed to it, would on their own ac- 
count reject, as they would be justified in doing. The terms of the 
second proposal, or that by which the Cyrenseans were to be bound, 
though appearing to contain the same penalty for them as the first did 
for their opponents, were, in effect, such, that, whether acquiesced in or re- 
jected by the Carthaginians, the contrivers would be equally guarded against 
suffering either the penalty it contained, or the punishment they feared 
at home. For, if the privilege of advancing ad libitum into the Cartha- 
ginian territory should be unthinkingly acceded to by the Philseni, the 
Cyrenaean ambassadors might acquire the greater part, or, indeed, all 
its possessions from Carthage, to which city itself they might proceed — 
a submission to which war itself would of course be preferable. And, 
on the other hand, if the proposal involving such an absurdity should be re- 
jected, it was calculated that a similar result would ensue, in a rupture 
of the negotiations, and a renewal of hostilities ! Thus, in either case, 
the crafty Cyrenseans had protected themselves from danger, and their 
country from any loss of territory, unless the Philseni should consent, 
contrary to all probability, to preserve the advantage they had gained for 
their countrymen and save them from a war, by agreeing to be buried 
alive where they stood! The two magnanimous brothers, however, as- 
sented to this dreadful alternative, and the Carthaginians evinced their 
gratitude to them by decreeing several honours to their memory at home, 
besides erecting altars over the spot where they were buried, which con- 
tinued for many ages to be the eastern boundary of the Carthaginian do- 
minions in Africa. Of these altars, entitled Arae Philxnorum, some 
remains, in the shape of sandstone pillars, with inscriptions nearly ob- 



m 



THE GREEN BOOK. 45 

No ! even a William Cobbett must confess 
They showed not such disinterestedness — 
That heaven, for which they dared a tyrant's flames, 
The generous Parson, for our sake, disclaims ; 
And, 'gainst him, though a thankless world conspire, 
He goes, for it, to everlasting fire ! 
Then, seek no more with satire to destroy, 
But, in the Church's cause, your pen employ — 
For, at her wealth, when envious laymen jeer. 
She surely may despise their impious laughter, 

literated, are supposed to exist to the present day. — {Delia Cella, in 
Heeren's African Researches, vol. i. chap. I, p. 55. 

Such is, in substance, the account given by Sallust of this transaction, 
an account derived, no doubt, from those Carthaginian books stated to 
have belonged to the hbrary of Hiempsal, king of Numidia, which the 
Roman historian tells us, he had caused to be interpreted for him and 
followed as the best sources of information in African affairs, and 
which were, most probably, a portion of the literary pillage of Carthage, 
that Scipio is mentioned to have bestowed upon the princes of Africa. 
(Sallust, Bel. Jug. 17 and 79. Plix. Hist. Nat. xviii. 5.) Valerius 
Maximus, who, in his account of this act of Carthaginian patriotism, 
seems to have followed some Greek or Cyrenaean historian, as he accuses 
the Philaeni of an act of injustice in leaving home too soon, which, both 
from the authority of Sallust, and the virtue naturally to be expected 
from their magnanimity, seems improbable, pays, however, this animated 
tribute to their noble self-devotion : — Ubi sunt superbse Carthaginis 
alta moenia ? ubi maritima gloria inclyti partus ? ubi cunctis littori- 
bus terribilis classis ? ubi tot exercitus ? ubi tantus equitatus ? ubi 
immenso Afr/cas spatio non content i spiritus P Omnia ista duobus 
Scipionibus Fortuna partita est. At Philaenonim egregii facti me- 
moriam ne patriae quidem inter it us extinxit. Nihil est igitur, excepta 
virtute, quod mortali animo ac nianu immortalequaeri posset P — (Val. 
Max. v. 6.) If the sandstone pillars, above-mentioned, could be proved 
to be the real remains of the Arae, Fhildenorum, a better inscription to 
the memory of the Carthaginian patriots, than these words of the Ro- 
man author, could scarcely be engraved upon their monument. 

What a pity it is, that every ancient work on Carthaginian history 
has perished. If we had even the ¥.ci^^y,Sr,viaKZv of the Emperor Claudius, 
in eight volumes, which, from the original materials extant in his time, 
would be comparatively valuable, and for which, with his TuoIuvuCjv, or 
history of Etrurian affairs, an almost equally interesting, though now 
obscure subject, he erected a new Museum at Alexandria, that the 
two publications might be alternately read there to the public, our loss 
would be partially compensated for. — (Sueton. in Claud, cap. 42.) 
But time has been almost as unsparing an adversary to the historical, as 
Cato to the political, existence of Carthage. — MS. Observations and 
Collections for a History of Carthage. 



46 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Since, as we've seen, to take their money here. 
Is ail the better for their souls hereafter.^ 
February y 1831. 



IMPROMPTU, 

Written^ at the time of the Anglesey Proclamations, in the leaf of a 
Scrap- Book, containing a portrait of the Marquis, next to the foU 
lowing well-k7iown verses .• — 

God takes the good, too good on earth to stay, 
And leaves the bad, too bad to take away. 



This couplet's truth, in Paget's case, we find — 
God took his leg, and left himself behind. 



LET FANATICS MURMUR AT LIFE. 
Air — Unknown, 



I. 

Let fanatics murmur at life, 

And bigots at pleasure repine ; 
We mind not their folly and strife. 

But drown all contention in wine : 
And, though they may dream they are " Saints, ^^ 

We're more so — my friends, are we not ? 

1 This epistle, originally written for a little publication of the " Comet 
Club," was meant to be nothing more, in point of style, than a speci- 
men of the " miisa pedestris," or that unassuming class of composition 
in verse, as contrasted with poetry, from the connexion of which with 
topics of a common or familiar, as distinguished from those of an eleva- 
ted or sentimental nature, merely that mode of expression is to be ex- 
pected which may be defined as prose in metre. This will consequently 
be a sufficient excuse for the roughness of some lines, which, even inde- 
pendent of the difficulty of giving passages of Scripture in a sufficiently 
clear or literal manner in smoother verses, would, were the lines more 
polished, have only served to render the entire composition less easy 
and natural. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 47 

For, while theyh^e all gloom and complaints, 
TVe sit here, content with our lot. 
Then, let each fill, and pass on the wine to the next ; 
There's no Lethe like this, when our hearts are perplexed ; 
And let music and joy 
Every moment employ. 
For *'eat, drink, and be merry," to-night is our text. . 

11. 

They tell us, that sages agree. 

The study of mankind is man ;^ 
Then, who is there wiser than we ? 

Let pedants reply if they can — 
For Truth in the world is concealed, 
And books only teach us to doubt ; 
But here every heart is revealed — 

For, " when the wine's in, the man's ow^." 
So, let each fill, and pass on the wine to the next; 
There's no Lethe like this, when our hearts are perplexed; 
And let music and joy 
Every moment employ. 
For " eat, drink, and be merry," to-night is our text. 

m. 

Divines, if they choose it, may think, 

They know more than we do of Heaven ; 
And say, if so deeply we drink. 

We'll lose every one of the " seven;" 
But we, in our bumpers, have found 

The Heavens that number surpass — 
For, oft as the bottle goes round, 
A Paradise beams in each glass. 
Then, let each fill, and pass on the wine to the next ; 
There's no Lethe like this, when our hearts are perplexed; 
And let music and joy 
Every moment employ. 
For "eat, drink, and be merry," to-night is our text. 
May bth, 1830. 

"I The proper study of mankind is man." — Pope. 



48 THE GREEN BOOK. 



A CHARACTER. 



Mes traits sont ceux de la satire : 
Je les lance en me defendant. 

Beranger. 



In manners vulgar, cold and sour in mind — 

In speech, one libel upon human kind — 

A gloomy croaker both at friends and foes — 

A dreary cloud to mirth where'er she goes — 

Save when her hen-pecked spouse — now, like herself, 

With scandal only pleased or sordid pelf — 

Conveys some lie, with which, at others' fame, 

Detraction's imps, her dearest kindred, aim, 

Or counts some petty saving, ever sure 

A ghastly leer of v\^elcome to procure. 

In looks, afraid the gazer's glance to meet— 

A conscious mass of envy and deceit. 

Of black ill-nature, and malignant art. 

To gash the feelings and to stab the heart. 

A ready firebrand in domestic strife, 

A forward old maid, yet a childless wife ; 

Childless, since favouring nature hath decreed, 

That vipers in our isle should never breed. 

In face, a yellow, withered, sickly thing — 

For how could health from such a conscience spring? 

In faith, half-canting hypocrite and fool; 

In reading, fitted for an infant school ; 

In writing, able just to scrawl her name — 

Her letters, ugly as her haggard frame ; 

In covetousness, never satisfied ; 

In meanness, only matched by low-born pride — 

A soul-less wretch, whom but one task becomes. 

To gripe for farthings or to scrape for crumbs. 

Yet, as the blind Egyptian turned of old 

From gods of marble, ivory, and gold — 

Gods formed in man's majestic air and shape — 

To crouch before a crocodile or ape, 

Thus, to her grovelling self, by this vile fiend. 

Strange to relate ! her husband's mind is weaned 



THE GREEN BOOK. 49 

From parents, brothers, all that should impart 
The purest love to every generous heart. 
Who that beholds this base intriguer live, 
Blest with the means her birth could never give, 
Who will not say, — " The proverb's truth is shown — 
The devil is always sure to mind his own." 
June Ibthy 1829. 



EPIGRAM, 

On being playfully asked by two pretty girls, which should one prefer 
if he were going to make a choice? 



'' How happy could I be with either," was said 

By Macbeath to his wives in the play ; 
But, were two such " charmers" as you in their stead. 

He could not wish either away. 
Oh ! no, until death with such angels he'd grapple — 

Then both are so temptingly fair. 
That, as Adam lost Heaven by eating an apple, 

I'd forfeit 7ny chance for d.pair.^ 



THE PARSON'S "HORN OF CHASE." 

A PARODY. 



I. 

To rob the poor, in open day. 

The pampered Parson leaves his dwelling ; 
By Peelers joined, he takes his way. 

With village brats around him yelling ; 
Behold him rush, like eager hounds. 

When hares or foxes greet their eyes — 
Sheep, goats, and oxen, he impounds. 

While, struck with dread, the peasant flies 

' Query, pear — Printer's Devil. 



50 THE GREEN BOOK. 

For, should the poor say '' might's not right," 

The *'man of God" his flock surrounding, 
With musket balls soon ends the fight, 

The Peeler's horn "All's well!" resounding — 
Resounding, 
The Peeler's horn, 
The Peeler's horn. 
The Peeler's horn, 
The knell 
Of Popish swains resounding ! 

II. 

At close of day, his duty o'er. 

Towards home the Parson's steps are bending ; 
His bugles sound to blood no more. 

But notes of " tithe got in" are sending ! 
His " gentle charmer" hears the sound. 

She flies into his holy arms. 
His Rev'rence then counts down each pound, 

By bay'nets drawn from plundered farms. 
The dinner-board displays its store. 

In Papist-purchased cheer abounding — 
" But first," he cries, "secure the door. 

For hark, the Whiteboy's horn is sounding !" 
Sounding, 
The Whiteboy's horn. 
The WJiiteboy's horn. 
The Whiteboy's horn. 
To arms ! 
Along the hills is sounding ! 
June, 1831. 



ANACREONTIC. 

I. 

Fill the goblet to the brink. 
Till in tides of bliss we sink ; 
Fill, be quick, when that is o'er, 
Have we not as much in store ? 



THE GREEN BOOK. 51 

Have we not as rich a draught 
As the last we sweetly quaffed ? 
Why, then, why, should we delay, 
To be happy when we may? 
With such wine as sparkles here. 
How can frowning Thought appear ? 
When such dazzling nectar flows, 
Wit with brightest fancy glows. 

n. 

Fill up — as Beauty's queen, one day. 
With laughing Bacchus chanced to stray, 
Her little son in tears she spied — 
*« What ails my boy V the Goddess cried. 
"Alas!" Love answered, with a sigh, 
" In vain my blunted arrows fly." 
"Cease," Bacchus said, and snatched the darts, 
*'ril make them pierce the firmest hearts." 
Then, in the rosy bowl he sipped. 
By turns the golden shafts he dipped — 
And since, whene'er Love's arrows miss. 
He bathes their points in wine like this. 
Nov. Uth, 1829. 



EPIGRAM, 

On reading the Marquis of Londonderry's speech in the House of 
Lords, upon the demolition of his windows for his opposition to the 
Reform Bill, 



Titled babbler, if still you have left any brains. 
Rejoice that the people have broken your panes : 
Prate no more to your ''order" of "popular crimes," 
But submit to the deed, as a " sign of the times." 
The lesson it gives for the outrage atones. 
Since, as Shakspeare observes, there are '^sermons in 

stones.'''^ 
Oct, 1831. 

^ '' Books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, 
And good in every thing/* 



52 THE GREEN BOOK, 



A VALENTINE. 



Heureux cent fois le mortel amoureux, 

Qui tous les jours peut te voir et t'entendre, 

Que tu regois avec un souris tendre, 

Qui voit son sort ecrit dans tes beaux yeux, 

Qui, consume de ces feux qu'il adore, 

A tes genoux oubliant I'univers, 

Parle d'amour et t'en reparle encore, 

Et malheureux qui n'en parle qu'en vers ! 

Voltaire, Epitre a Mademoiselle Gossin. 



Though this, Maria, is the time, 
When lovers rack their heads for rhyme, 
Striving to paint your matchless beauty, 
I'll leave them such a hopeless duty ; 
And, laughing at the foolish tribe, 
Describing what they can't describe, 
I'll merely tell a little tale. 
So short, your patience cannot fail. 
The famous Countess De Grolee 
Lived in a very wicked way. 
Till, at the age of eighty-four, 
Sickness compelled her to give o'er. 
Her friends, perceiving she was going, 
And, as good Catholics, well knowing 
Saint Peter will not open Heaven 
To those the Church has not forgiven. 
Advised her strongly to repent, 
And for a famed confessor sent. 
The holy man, ''with zeal on flame," 
To save her soul, impatient came. 
And, as on such occasions fit. 
Her friends prepared the room to quit. 
" No, no," the witty Countess said, 
" You need not leave my dying bed — 
I'll tell my sins while all are by. 
And yet — I'll 7iot disedify. 
I have been young and handsome too. 
Men said so — I believed 'twas true ; 

The rest so easy 'tis to guess. 

It would be useless to confess !" 



THE GREEN BOOK. 53 

Thus has it been, dear maid, with me — 
I saw — I met — I spoke with thee, 
And — 'tis so easy to be guessed— 
I surely need not tell the rest. 

February Uthy 1830. 



WORDS FOR MUSIC. 



I. 

Come, let us pass the night gayly away ; 

Is there not toil enough through the long day ? 
And leisure's a treasure 
Too glorious to measure, 
Then, let us have pleasure, 

Whilever we may. 

Yes, let us pass the night, Sic. 

II. 

Here, round the festive board, let us unite. 
Where Mirth and Harmony sweetly invite ; 
Wine streaming, wit beaming. 
Bright eyes round ns gleaming. 
Each moment is teeming 

With rapture to-night. 
Yes, round the festive board, Slc. 

Nov. Is/, 1835. 



ON AN IMPROVIDENT VOCALIST. 



" Vox et praeterea nihil." 



I. 

Poor Tom, alas ! too well aware 
That he can sing, now only goes 

To balls and dinners, and no care 
Upon the means of life bestows. 
5 



54 THE GREEN BOOK. 

II. 

Ah ! Tom, it is a dangerous thing 
In such a way the world to please — 

For, when the foolish bird would sing. 
Remember, Tom, — she lost the cheese.* 
Jan. 5th, 1837. 



DAVID'S LAMENT OVER SAUL AND JONATHAN. 

2 Samuel^chap. i. v. 19 — 27. 



I. 

On the high places, Israel, thy beauty and pride 
By the shafts of the haughty Philistine have died :^ 
Long, long, shall thy sorrow the mighty bemoan— 
The flower of thy valour and boast of thy throne. 

11. 

Oh, tell not in Gath how untimely their fate. 
Nor, in Ashkelon's streets, their destruction relate — 
Lest Philistia's proud daughters with triumph should glow, 
And exult o'er the fall of their circumcised foe. 

III. 

Ye hills of Gilboa, ye hills where the shield 
Of Saul, once the mighty, is cast on the field ! 

^ "The life of him that dependeth on another man's table is not to be 
counted for a life: for he polluteth himself with other men's meat, but 
a wise man well nurtured will beware thereof." — EcclesiasticuSj chap, 
xl. V. 29. 

2 The introduction of an allusion to the Philistine archers, in the ver- 
sion of this and the viith stanza, is founded upon the sacred historian's 
statement, in his account of the engagement at Gilboa, in which, after 
mentioning that " the battle went sore against Saul," it is added, that 
" the archers hit him, and he was sore wounded of the archersr ( 1 Sam. 
xxxi. 3.) And, in 2 Samuel i. 18, it is related that David, after Saul's 
death, " bade them teach the children of Israel the use of the 6oit;" — no 
doubt, on the same principle that the kings of Scotland, in the middle 
ages, endeavoured to promote the practice of archery amongst their sub- 
jects, that they might be able to compete with the English, of whose 
fatal ability in the use of the bow and arrows, Scotland — like the Jews 
in the case of the Philistines— had experienced such formidable proofs. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 55 

Without dews or soft showers in bleakness remain ; 
For on you, the anointed of Israel was slain. ^ 

IV. 

From the blood of the valiant, in victory's track, 
The arrows of Jonathan never drew back f 
In the midst of the charge, where the brave thickest fall, 
Whose sword was more red than the sabre of Saul ? 

V. 

Saul and Jonathan, gallant, illustrious pair, 

In life, as in death, undivided ye were ! 

Your speed was the speed of the eagle's swift flight, 

Your strength was the strength of the lion in fight ! 

VI. 

Ye daughters of Israel, weep over Saul, 

And oft to remembrance his glory recal ; 

Your monarch — who made you so fair to behold. 

Who clothed you in scarlet and decked you with gold \^ 

VII. 

But vainly the mighty went forth in their might ; 
Jehovah had doomed them to carnage and flight \^ 

• The union of martial, devotional, pathetic, and national feeling, in 
the original of this stanza, is admirable; and the allusion to the ioss of 
Saul's shield is expressed in the true spirit of a " warrior bard," who 
could sympathize with the bold admonition addressed to the young Spar- 
tan, on presenting him with his buckler: — " Return w;/fA it, or on it I" 
The elevated regret of the Hebrew poet for that loss presents an honour- 
able contrast to the Epicurean indifference of Horace's " relida non bene 
parmula^'' and the still more shameless, though amusing, impudence of 
the Greek poet, Archilochus. "I have thrown away my huckler,^^ said 
he, in a fragment of one of his lost works, "but I shdWJind another; 
and I have saved my life !" 

2 "The bow of Jonathan turned not hack^ — Authorised version 
OF the bible. 

" the bow of Jonathan was never held back,^^ — Geddes's Transla- 
tion. 

2 Nothing can be more happy than the art with which the poet endea- 
vours to excite the sorrow of his countrywomen for the death of Saul, 
through the medium of recollections connected with the general passion 
of the sex for personal finery, and their proportionate inclination to like 
those who can best contribute to the gratification of that expensive foible. 

^ " And Samuel said unto Saul, Why hast thou disquieted me to bring 
me up 1 To-morrow shalt thou and thy sons be with me : the 



56 THE GREEN BOOK. 

And thou, too, oh Jonathan, thou wert laid low, 
In thy beauty and strength by the shafts of the foe. 

VIII. 

Oh Jonathan ! dear as a brother to me, 
How distressed is my heart when I think upon thee ! 
The love thou hast borne me can never be told — 
To thine, oh ! the wild love of women were cold.^ 

IX. 

Alas for the lovely ! — alas for the brave ! — 
And Israel's glory that rests in their grave. 
Alas ! for the weapons of war that have perished. 
In the brave she adored, and the lovely she cherished.^ 
December llth, 1836. 

Lord also shall deliver the host of Israel into the hand of the Philis- 
tines." — 1 Samuel xxviii. 15, 19. 

The death of Saul, in the circumstance of the real or supposed spectre 
related to have appeared to him before his last engagement; in his 
bravery, on that occasion, notwithstanding the naturally depressing eft'ect 
of such an apparition ; and, in his throwing himself upon his sword to 
avoid being taken by the victorious enemy, presents a considerable 
resemblance to Plutarch's account of the particulars of the fall of Brutus, 
at Philippi. On Greek and Roman principles, Saul, in his last battle, 
in his Waterloo, certainly died like a hero. 

' "The soul of Jonathan was knit with the soul of David, and Jona- 
than loved him as his own soul." — I Samuel, xviii. 1. 

2 In this versification of David's Lament, the author has kept as close 
as possible to the Bible, consistent with the metre and stanza selected as 
the best adapted for doing justice to the subject in rhyme. The short- 
ness, nevertheless, of the three verses in the Bible, answering to stanzas 
i., vii., and ix. of the poetical version, having rendered it impossible to 
stretch their meaning through the four lines indispensable in each stanza, 
some liberties have been taken with the original in those stanzas. These 
liberties consist in the poetical amplifications made use of in stanzas i. 
and ix.— in accordance, however, with the spirit of those portions of the 
original — and in the two allusions made in stanzas i. and vii. to the Phi- 
listine bowmen and to the predestined defeat of the Israelite army, as 
being the most appropriate circumstances, from their positive historical 
connection with the subject, that could be introduced under the necessity 
alluded to. Allowing for those liberties, the above version will, perhaps, 
be found to imbody more of the literal sense of the authorized translation 
of the Bible, with something like what may be supposed to have been 
the metrical " roll" or efiTect of the original poem, than any versification 
yet given in English rhyme. 

For some further critical and literary remarks connected with, and for 
a more exact prose translation of, David's elegy, than that given in the 
English version of the Bible, see the " Postscript" at the end of the 
volume. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 57 



'PQ * * * * * 



I. 

Oh, let not Malice bid thee grieve, 

Or darkly teach thee to suspect 
This tender heart could e'er deceive, 

Or wound thy fondness with neglect; 
For, though my boyhood loved to roam, 

Like birds that fly from tree to tree. 
In thee, at length, I've found a home, 

And life is only life with thee, 

II. 

Then, why should Slander's voice alarm. 

Or jealous doubts disturb thy love? 
Believe me. Beauty boasts no charm 

That could one thought from thee remove : 
To me, the world's a boundless sea. 

Where, like the bird that ''found no rest," 
To one sweet ark of peace I flee — 

That only ark — thy faithful breast. 

April nth, 1829. 



IMPROMPTU, 

On seeing a Reverend Dignitary of the Establishment , heating some 
poor hoys from hehind his carriage, 

I CANNOT help thinking that 's curious behaviour, 

In one who professes to follow our Saviour. 

He said, "Let none check litde children's approach" — ^ 

Yon pampered priest whips them away from his coach ! 

Besides, without meaning the Church to disparage. 

May I ask, " What Aposde e'er rolled in his carriage ?" 

May Idth, 1829. 

» Mark viii. 13, 14. 

5* 



58 THE GREEN BOOK. 

NABIS AND THE UNION. 
{Written upon the passing of the Irish Coercion Bill.) 



" Experimentum in corpore vili." 

Macauley's Speech on the Coercion Act. 



When Sparta, from her ancient fame declined, 
In prostrate fear and abject slavery pined, 
O'er her fallen sons the tyrant Nabis reigned, 
With brutal power by force alone maintained — 
Like those who now a suffering land o'erawe. 
With drum-head justices and martial law. 

.'Midst other engines by this despot framed, 
T' extort by torture what his avarice claimed, 
A moving image, filled with spikes, he made. 
Whose form his consort's air and garb displayed. 
Whene'er a Spartan dared refuse to yield 
Whatever sum the greedy tyrant willed, 
Towards his feigned queen the prisoner straight was led ; 
Quick round his frame its arms the image spread ; 
Touched by a spring, forth flew its iron points, 
Transpierced the victim's flesh and crashed his joints ; 
Till, in the keenest pangs of lingering death. 
The captive, bathed in blood, resigned his breath.^ 

My country ! in the hapless Spartan's fate, 
Behold an emblem of thy present state ! 
The captive, for his wealth condemned to gasp 
Within th' accursed engine's deadly clasp. 
Displays the Union England's love affords — 
A gripe of robbery ! — an embrace of swords ! 
And must this tortured land, too long compressed 
By such a Nabis' grasp, in misery rest? — 
Slaves, can ye ask ? still crouching and dismayed !— 
The tyrant's chain may form the freeman's blade.^ 

1833. 

1 Polybius, lib.xiii. cap. 7., torn, iii., p. 451, &c., edit. Schweighseuser. 

2 See " Postscript to Nabis and the Union." 



THE GREEN BOOK. 59 



ALMIGHTY LORD. 



^Devotion is the affection of the heart, and this I feel ; for, when I view 
the wonders of creation, I bow to the majesty of Heaven.' — Ken- 
nedy's Conversations of Lord Byron, p. 135. 



Almighty Lord, Eternal Cause 
Of wide Creation's wondrous laws ! 
"Whose word, Omnific Source of Life, 
From dreary, elemental strife, 
Illumed the golden fount of light, 
And gemmed the sky with worlds by night, 
While thousands and ten thousands more, 
The farther Science can explore. 
Sublimely wheel their fiery race 
Along the boundless realms of space ! 
How insio^nificant, how mean 
Is earthly pomp to such a scene ! 
But when the microscopic glass 
Displays the smallest blade of grass, 
The crystal stream, the air we breathe, 
The dew from, heaven, the earth beneath, 
With countless tiny millions swarmed, 
Yet ALL with nice perfection formed ! 
Oh, wisest, greatest, highest, best, 
Devotion swells my throbbing breast ! — 
Devotion, not the scheme of knaves. 
To fleece the crowd, their blinded slaves. 
But such by Reason jusdy called. 
From Superstition disenthralled ; 
Reason, whose torch and Wisdom's voice 
Suffice to guide to virtue's choice — 
I spurn vile Passion's guilty fires, 
And pitying monarchs' low desires, 
Their transient power, their sordid gold 
By which mankind are bought and sold ; 
The dreams of fabling Fear dissolve ; 
No gloomy doubts my soul involve ; 
Truth hurls Imposture from her throne , 
And bids me trust in Thee alone ! 

February 27th, 1829. 



60 THE GREEN BOOK. 



IMPROMPTU, 

To Miss . 



Whene'er I address you, you bid me say '* Miss," 
And I own there are excellent reasons for this ; 
Since your temper and face make it equally plain, 
That a man would be better to miss you than gain* 

September lihy 1830. 



THE EPISCOPAL MAMMOTH, 

ALIAS 



" She walks in beauty, like the night." — Hebrew Melodies, 



I. 

He walks in fatness — what a sight 

For Christian climes and Christian eyes! 

His coat as '' Hunt's Jet Blacking" bright— 
A rich silk apron o'er his thighs ! 

His cheeks, in that plethoric plight 
That Lent, to Popish priests, denies. 

II. 

Thy day is o'er — thou'lt soon be less- 
Men do not venerate thy Grace-— 

They say, " while v)e are in distress, 
How bloated is yon Bishop's face — - 

Where looks of gluttony express 

How carnal is their dwelling-place !" 



* The first of a series of parodies of the Hebrew Melodies, devoted to 
the Church, which were written for, and commenced with, the Comet, 
May 1st, 1831. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 61 

III. 

And view the cheek, and mark the brow, 

Of him, in church so eloquent. 
At preaching patience under woe — 

They tell of nights in boozing spent — 
Of port and claret's ruby glow— 

And loves — (of course ?) — all innocent P^^ 



* The following parodies, on the subjoined sonnet of Lord Byron and 
the last of his Hebrew Melodies, are from the pen of a member of the 
original Comet Club, and are at once too good in themselves and too 
apposite to the present occasion, to be omitted here. 

SONXET. 

To Genevra, 

Thine eyes' blue tenderness, thy long fair hair, 

And the wan lustre of thy features, caught 

From contemplation — where serenely wrought, 
Seems Sorrow's softness charmed from its despair — 
Have thrown such speaking sadness in thine air, 

That — but I know thy blessed bosom fraught 

With mines of unalloy'd and stainless thought — 
I should have deemed thee doomed to earthly care. 
"With such an aspect, by his colours blent, 

When from his beauty-breathing pencil born, 
(Except that thou hast nothing to repent) 

The Magdalen of Guido saw the morn — 
Such seem'st thou — but how much more excellent ! 

With naught Remorse can claim — nor Virtue scorn. 



Sonnet. 

To the Right Reverend Father in God, 

The Lord Bishop of . 

Thy cheeks' round ruddiness, thy broad gray wig. 
And the rich plumpness of thy features — caught 

From drinking claret — (who'd have ever thought 
A Bishop so addicted to a swig]) 

Have given thee a rotundity so big, 

That — but I know thy blessed paunch is fraught 



6t5 THE GREEN BOOK. 

With all a Prelate's appetite e'er sought,^ 
I should have deemed your Reverence — a pig.2 
" With such an aspect, by his colours blent," 

When born upon the bard's dramatic page, 
(And Uke him, too, upon his glass intent,) 

The FalstafFof Will. Shakspeare trod the stage — 
Such seem'st thou — but how much more corpulent ! 

With ALL thy friends can wish — church patronage 



AN EPISCOPAL PORTRAIT. 



" A spirit passed before me : I beheld." — Hebrew Melodies. 



I. 

A Bishop passed before me : I beheld 
A face of immorality well veiled — 
Amazement seized on every eye save mine — 
As on he moved — a shapeless, huge Divine ! 
Upon his bones the bloated flesh did shake ; 
And, in deep, pompous accents, thus he spake : — 

II. 

" Who is more just than II or who more pure 1 
Deem'st thou the Church Established insecure 1 
Tillers of clay ! vile dwellers in the dust ! 
The tithes are mine by law, and pay ye must / 
Degraded clowns ! immersed in Popery's night, 
Blind to my sermons, filled with Gospel light !" 



^ Superbum 

Pontljicum potiore coenis. — Horace, ii. 14. 

2 « We are told by Plutarch," says Shiel, " that a banquet was once 
provided by a celebrated epicure, consisting of an immense variety of 
dishes, but that the whole was made up oi pork, which had been cooked 
after different fashions. The Church is like \hepork that supplied the 
materials of this variegated feast, and admits of dressing in an infi- 
nite diversity of ways. God forbid, however, that we should insinuate 
that any of the Dignitaries of the Establishment offered the comparison 
to our fancy, or that we should exclaim at the sight of one of them, 
Epicuri de grege porcus I" 



THE GREEN BOOK. 63 

SONG FOR UNITED IRISHMEN OR IRISHMEN UNITED. 



"Frangimur si collidimur !" 

Motto of the Seven United Provinces of 
Holland — about the size of Ulster / 

Air — " Major-domo am 7." 

I. 

Let fools waste the night, 
That was made for delight, 

In wrangling on Church or on State ; 
We care not a fig 
About Tory or Whig, 

Or puzzle our heads with debate. 
We leave the great to bribe and to spout ; 
TVe leave the mob to hiss and to shout ; 
We ask not, who's in or who's out? 
But laugh. 
And quaff. 
And send the song gayly about : 
For Tories and Whigs may be right or be wrong, 
But we ALL like a bottle, a friend, and a song.^ 

II. 

Where virtue is seen, 
Be it Orange or Green, 

That virtue we love and respect; 
No distinction we know, 
Of a friend or a foe. 

By the nicknames of party or sect. 
We leave the great, &c. 

III. 

Then, away with the ass 
Who would prate o'er his glass 

Of Green or of Orange to-night! 
For good fellows like us 
Only care to discuss 

The merits of red and of white. 
We leave the great, &c. 
May 26thy 1837. 

I This couplet to be repeated in singing. 



64 THE GREEN BOOK. 

EPIGRAM, 
On a big-mouthed Glutton, 

" Give me some place to stand !" Archimedes once cried, 
*< And I'll move the whole earth at my will." — 

Had you the same thing, Ned, your mouth is so wide, 
You might swallow the globe as a pill. 

ilfarcA 27/^,1829. 



A CONTRAST FOR THE CHURCH. 

Suggested by reading, during a season of famine and pestilence in 
the West of Ireland, of some tithe-seizures of potatoes, potato-pots^ 
<^c., attended with a legalized slaughter of their miserable owners, 
in consequence of an attempt at "a rescueJ'^ 

The ancient natives of Marseilles, 
As Strabo, if I err not, tells, — 
Like Tories, in the present time, 

Asserting, 'tis for Ireland's good 
The Church's reign of w^ealth and crime 
Should be upheld with guiltless blood — 

* The apparently excessive violence of the lines on this subject cannot 
be more appropriately justified, than by adverting to the single narrative, 
among many such scenes, of the " Battle of Skibbereen," the name 
given by Cobbett to the tithe-massacre perpetrated by Parson Morrit, of 
Skibbereen, in the county of Cork, on his Popish parishioners, in 1821, 
a year of scarcity and pestilence. No less than thirty persons are stated 
to have been " sent to another v^^orld" on this occasion, by the " man of 
God," who was both a Parson and Magistrate, and, as such, ordered the 
Police to fire ! The people's resistance to his decimating Reverence 
arose from their having left him the tenth perch of every potato-ridge in 
their fields, the produce of which he refused to dig and carry away, in- 
sisting on taking his tithe out of the potatoes they had stored up, 
and which were the only fuod they had to live upon ! Amongst 
other affecting circumstances, on this occasion, the following instance 
occurred. A fine boy, about 14 years old, the only child of a poor 
widow, who resided in a miserable hut on the road-side, in the neigh- 
bourhood of this military Pastor, having run out to ascertain the cause 
of the volleys of musketry, was fired at and shot through the body; and, 
having crawled for refuge to the furze-bush of an adjoining ditch, died 
there, and remained undiscovered till he was washed down by the floods 
upon the road between Rosscarbery and Skibbereen, where a friend of 



THE GREEN BOOK. 65 

Decreed at each year's termination, 

A human life should be devoted, 
Thinking the welfare of their nation 

Could be by homicide promoted: 
Yet, till the destined year had fled, 

On whose last day the victim died, 
His pitying countrymen, 'tis said. 

With richest food his wants supplied. 
Oh ! how unlike that Church accursed. 

And those black vampires who maintain it, 
They starve the suffering peasant first. 

And then, consign him to the bayonet. 
1831. 

the writer of these lines beheld the unfortunate mother lamenting over 
the disfigured corpse, with feelings which it is so much more easy to 
imagine than it ever could be to describe. Such were the ^^ spiritual 
functions " performed, in the name of the religion of meekness and 
poverty, by this anointed specimen of the " union of Church and State," 
whose sanctified exclamation, when sallying forth upon his predatory- 
mission, is stated to have been, " Mi/ tithes or blood !" It was this 
worthy subject for satire which suggested the following parody in one 
of the early numbers of the Comet. 

PARSON MORRIT's ADDRESS TO THE POLICE BEFORE THE "BATTLE 



"Warriors and chiefs ! should the shaft or the sword.''— Hebrew Melodies. 



I. 
Brave Peelers, march on, with the musket and sword 
And fight for my ilthes in the name of the Lord! 
Away with whoever appears in your path — 
And seize all each peasant in Skibbereen hath ! 

IT. 

Hesitate not — the laiv is on our side you know ! 
" The Church is in danger!" and yonder the foe! 
If women and children expire at your feet! 
'Tis a doom good enough for the Papists to meet ! 

III. 
The rebels refuse their last morsel to part — 
Let your bullets and bay'nets be fleshed in each heart! 
No matter what Priests or Dissenters u'ill say — 
Wj^ get ALL my tithes^ or Fll perish to-day ! 

6 



66 THE GREEN BOOK. 



BRING ME WINE !— BRING ME WINE ! 



The keenest pangs the wretched find, 

Are rapture to the dreary void, 
The leafless desert of the mind, 

The waste of feelings unemployed. 

Byroit. 

I. 

Bring me wine ! — bring me wine ! — for my sad spirits 

sink — 
I sigh o'er the past — from the future I shrink — 
The past, no soft ties of affection endear — 
The future, is shrouded in darkness and fear — 
But let ALL life's evils against me combine — 
I'll defy them to-night! — bring me wine ! — bring me wine! 

II. 

Bring me wine ! — bring me wine ! Ah ! how wrongly they 

deem, 
Who think that my days pass in one happy dream. 
Though foremost in Pleasure's and Beauty's gay throng, 
I join in the laugh, in the dance, and the song, 
In solitude, oh, what dejection is mine ! 
But away with all gloom ! — bring me wine ! — bring me 

wine! 

III. 

Bring me wine ! — bring me wine ! Could my spirit have 

bowed. 
To grovel in Mammon's dull cave with the crowd, 
I had not been thus, unbeloved and unknown — 
Yet my thoughts and my actions have all been my own : 
With a soul, proud and free, then I will not repine — 
But this heart — this lone heart ! — ^bring me wine ! — bring 

me wine ! 

December 2Sthy 1836. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 67 

EPIGRAM, 
On Miss . 



Thrice happy the man who gets thee for a wife ! 

Thrice happy, indeed, since he's sure of salvation ! 
For, if Heaven's to be gained, we are told that this life 

Must be spent in repentance and mortification. 

January 20th, 1830. 



TRANSLATION FROM VOLTAIRE'S TRAGEDY OF 
MAHOMET. 

Act II. Scene 5th, 

Zopire, supreme magistrate of Mecca, and priest of the Caaba, or 
principal Heathen temple in that city, having banished Mahomet, on the 
first propagation of his novel opinions, the Prophet fled to Medina, 
which embraced his doctrines. After a v^'ar of fifteen years, in which 
Mahomet captured Zopire's two children, and Zopire slew Mahomet's 
son, the victorious exile lays siege to Mecca ; but preferring from pohcy 
to get possession of the town, rather by a reconciliation with Zopire than 
by apparent artifice or violence, a truce is concluded, during which, on 
the day previous to its expiration, the following dialogue takes place in 
an interview between the Prophet and his old adversary. 



ZOPIRE. 

Ah ! what a weight of grief o'erpowers my mind ! 
Thus forced to meet this foe of human kind ! 

MAHOMET. 

Zopire, since by the favouring will of Heaven 
At length a sanction to our friendship's given, 
In Mahomet's presence blush not to appear — 
But speak thy thoughts, unchecked by doubt or fear. 



ZOPIRE. 

Ah, quel fardeau cruel a ma douleur profonde ! 
Moi, recevoir ici cet ennemi du monde! 

MAHOMET. 

Approche, et puisqu^ enfin le ciel veut nous unir, 
Vols Mahomet sans crainte et parle sans rougir. 



68 THE GREEN BOOK. 

ZOPIRE. 

For thee alone I blush, whose artifice, 

Even to the brink of rain's black abyss, 

With impious fraud, hath drawn thy native land — 

For thee alone, v^hose parricidal hand 

Of every crime here sows tlie baleful seed — 

Whose plots in peace new scenes of carnage breed- 

Whose name with deadly strife distracts the lives 

Of husbands, parents, mothers, daughters, wives — 

Who form'st a truce but to contrive new arts 

To plant the murderer's poignard in our hearts. 

Discord and Falsehood ever follow thee. 

Audacious monster of hypocrisy. 

Dost thou, thy country's tyrant scourge, appear 

T'announce a God and offer peace even here ? 

MAHOMET. 

If thou wert not Zopire, I'd preach to thee 
The God I then would feign to speak by me ; 
The sword and Koran, in my blood-stained hands, 
Would bow the silent world to my commands ; 
While, terrible as thunder's awful sound. 
My withering voice the boldest would confound. 



ZOPIRE. 

Je rougis pour toi seul, pour toi dont I'artifice 
A traine ta patrie au bord du precipice ; 
Pour toi de qui la main seme ici forfaits, 
Et fait naitre la guerre au milieu de la paix. 
Ton nom seul parmi nous divise les families, 
Les epoux, les parens, les meres, et les filles; 
Et le treve pour toi n'est qu'un moyen nouveau, 
Pour venir dans nos cceurs enf)ncer le couleau. 
La discorde civile est partout sur ta trace. 
Assemblage inoui de mensonge et d'audace, 
Tyran de ton pays, est-ce ainsi qu'en ce lieu 
Tu viens donner la paix et m'annoncer un Dieu ? 

MAHOMET. 

Si j'avais a repondre a d'autres qu'a Zopire, 
Je ne ferais parler que le Dieu qui m'inspire : 
Le glaive et l' Alcoran, dans mes sanglantes mains, 
Imposeraient silence au reste des humains ; 
Ma voix ferait sur eux les effets du tonnerre, 
Et je verrais leurs fronts attaches a, la terre; 



THE GREEN BOOK. 69 

But now, too great to need delusive arts, 

My soul to thee each inmost thought imparts : 

Then, since we're thus alone, my purpose know— 

I AM ambitious — are not all men so ? 

But ne'er king, pontiff, chief, or citizen yet 

Conceived a plan so grand as Mahomet. 

Each realm in turn hath gained a splendid name 

By laws, by arts, but more by martial fame. 

At length Arabia's happy hour's arrived ; 

Her noble sons, of fame too long deprived, 

Have seen, alas ! their generous worth obscured — 

In sandy wilds ingloriously immured. 

But now new days, for victory marked, arise ; 

From north to south the world in ruin lies ! 

See ! bleeding Persia mourns her falling throne ; 

Egypt laments her ancient grandeur flown ; 

And slavery's yoke or servile fear o'erwhelms 

The wide extent of India's prostrate realms ! 

Behold th' imperial walls of Constantine 

Eclipsed of former splendour, fast decline : 

Even the vast empire of majestic Rome 

Hath bent beneath its long impending doom, 

And scattered round, dishonoured, crushed, and dead, 

The mighty giant's severed limbs are spread ! 



Mais je te parle en homme, et sans rien deguiser, 
Je me sens assez grand pour ne pas t'abuser. 
Vois quel est Mahomet ; nous sommes seuls ; ecoute 
Je suis ambitieux ; tout homme Test, sans doute ; 
Mais jamais roi, pontife, ou chef, ou citoyen, 
Ne conput un projet aussi grand que le mien. 
Chaque peuple a son tour a brille sur la terre, 
Par les lois, par les arts, et surtout par la guerre ; 
Le temps de I' Arable est a la fin venu. 
Ce peuple genereux, trop long-temps inconnu, 
Laissait dans ses deserts ensevelir sa gloire ; 
Voici les jours nouveaux marques pour la victoire. 
Vois du nord au midi I'univers desole, 
La Perse encore sanglante, et son trone ebranle, 
L'Inde esclave et timide, et I'Egypte abaissee, 
Des murs de Constantin la splendeur eclipsee ; 
Vois I'empire romain tombant de toutes parts, 
Ce grand corps dechire, dont les membres epars 
Languissent disperses sans honneur et sans vie ; 
Sur ces debris du monde elevons 1' Arabic. 

6* 



70 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Then, let us boldly seize the favouring hour, 

O'er the falTn world to raise Arabia's power ! 

Another faith, another yoke must bind, 

Another deity deceive mankind. 

'Twas thus Osiris Egypt's sceptre gained ; 

'Twas thus in Asia Zoroaster reigned ; 

Minos in Crete, and Numa thus of old 

The vulgar herd in Italy controlled ; 

Beneath imperfect laws, with ease subdued 

A race ungoverned, ignorant, and rude ! 

A thousand years since then have past, but now 

The nations to a nobler sway shall bow — 

Change for my faith the phantoms they adore, 

And, as they yield, exalt my grandeur more ! 

Cease then to brand me as my country's foe ; 

I strive, Zopire, her idols to o'erthrow; 

I strive, Zopire, her scattered tribes to bring 

Beneath one God, one prophet, and one king ; 

And, conquering discord, thus for ever close 

That baleful spring whence all her weakness flows. 

These are 7ny aims, on these, and these alone, 

I build my country's splendour and my own ! 

ZOPIRE. 

These are thy plans ! for such detested ends, 

To change the world thy mad presumption tends ! 



II faat un nouveau culte, il faut de nouveaux fers, 

II faut un nouveau dieu pour I'aveugle univers. 

En Egypte Osiris, Zoroastre en Asie, 

Chez les Cretois Minos, Numa dans I'ltalie, 

A des peuples sans moeurs. et sans culte, et sans rois, 

Donnerent aisement d'insuffisantes lois. 

Je viens apres milles ans changer ces lois grossieres. 

J'apporte un joug plus noble aux nations entieres. 

J'abolis les faux dieux ; et rnon culte epure, 

De ma grandeur naissante est le premier degre. 

Ne me reproche point de trom[>er ma patrie; 

Je detruis sa faiblesse et son idolatrie ; 

Sous un roi, sous un dieu, je viens la reunir; 

Et, pour la rendre illustre, il la faut asservir. 

ZOPIRE. 

Voila done tes desseins ! c'est done toi dont I'audace 
De la terre a ton gre pretend changer ia face ! 



THE GREEN BOOK. 71 

Thou seek'st, by fear and massacre combined, 
To crush beneath thy will the human mind. 
Thy lips pretend Heaven's dictates to impart, 
While Desolation reigns where'er thou art. 
But, if our hearts, deprived of Wisdom's light. 
Have slept too long in Error's dreary night. 
Must the rash hand of Violence presume. 
With Horror's torch to dissipate the gloom? 
What is thy right to preach, predict, thy claim 
To grasp the censer, and at empire aim ? 

MAHOMET. 

The right a lofty, firm, and dauntless mind 
Claims o'er the vulgar, ever weak and blind ! 

ZOPIRE. 

What ! every wretch, whose factious daring can, 
May forge new chains to bind his fellow-man ? 
May, if he wills it, splendidly deceive ? 

MAHOMET. 

Yes ; the vile crowd in error must believe ; 
They need my worship, whether false or true ; 
But how canst thou their senseless idols view 



Tu veux, en apportant le carnage et reffroi, 
Commander aux humains de penser comme toi ; 
Tu ravages le monde el tu pretends I'instruire, 
Ah! si par des erreurs il s'est laisse seduire, 
Si la nuit du mensonge a pu nous egarer, 
Par quels flambeaux affreux veux-tu nous eclairer'? 
Quel droit as-tu re^u, d'enseigner, de predire] 
De porter fencensoir, et d'aff'ecter I'empire ] 

MAHOMET. 

Le droit qu'un esprit vaste et ferme en ses desseins 
A sur I'esprit grossier des vulgaires humaines. 

ZOPIRE. 

Et quoi ! tout factieux, qui pense avec courage, 
Doit donner aux mortals un nouvel esclavage ] 
II a droit de tromper s'il trompe avec grandeur 1 

MAHOMET. 

Oui; je connais ton peuple; il a besoin d'erreur; 

Ou veritable ou faux, mon culte est necessaire. 

Que t'ont produit tes dieux 1 quel bien t'ont-ils pu faire % 



72 THE GREEN BOOK. 

With stupid awe ? what good can they bestow ? 
What laurels round their worthless altars grow ? 
Thy sect's obscure and grovelling laws enslave 
The noblest soul — they enervate the brave — 
Mine fire the slumbering spirit to the fray — 
Change men to heroes — 

ZOPIRE. 

JRobbers, rather say — 
With thy curs'd maxims to Medina flee ! 
Where Tyranny and Falsehood reign with thee ; 
Where, while her lawless flag Imposture waves, 
Those who should be thy masters shrink to slaves ; 
Those who should be thy equals fawn around — 

MAHOMET. 

Equals ! — 'tis long since Mahomet's could be found! 
I rule Medina — Mecca quakes with fear ; 
Believe, take peace, or dread thy ruin near. 

ZOPIRE. 

Talk not of peace — thy thoughts new treason plot — 
Deceit's thy object — 



Quels lauriers vois-tu croitre au pied de leurs autels 1 
Ta secte obscure et basse avilit les mortels, 
Enerve le courage, et rend Thomme stupide ; 
La mienne eleve Tame et la rende intrepide. 
Ma loi fait des heros. 

ZOPIRE. 

Dis plutot des brigands. 
Porte ailleurs tes legons, Tecole des tyrans ; 
Va vanter I'imposture a Medine ou tu regnes, 
Ou tes maitres seduits marchent sous tes enseignes, 
Ou tu vois tes egaux a tes pieds abattus. 

MAHOMET. 

Des egaux ! des long-temps Mahomet n'en a plus. 
Je fais trembler la Mecque, et je rcgne a Medine : 
Crois-moi, repois la paix si tu crains ta ruine. 

ZOPIRE. 

La paix est dans ton bouche et ton coeur en est loin: 
Penses-tu me tromper ] 



THE GREEN BOOK. 73 

MAHOMET. 

Mahomet needs it not. 
The weak deceive — the mighty may command — 
To-morrow, think, canst thou my power withstand ? 
Reflect in time, what I request to-day, 
To-morrow I can force thee to obey ; 
To-morrow thou, beneath my yoke, must bend ; 
To-day submit — and Mahomet is thy friend. 

ZOPIRE. 

We, friends ! we, wretch ! by what new prodigy ? 
Could even a god unite Zopire with thee ? 

MAHOMET. 

Yes ; there is one, Zopire, that pleads by me ; 
One ever followed. 

ZOPIRE. 

Who? 



Thy int'rest— 



MAHOMET. 

Necessity. 



MAHOMET, 



Je n'en ai pas besoin. 
C^est le faible qui trompe, et le puissant commande. 
Demain j'ordonnerai ce que je te demande ; 
Demain je puis te voir a mon joug asservi: 
Aujourd'hui Mahomet veut etre ton ami. 

ZOPIRE. 

Nous amis ! nous ] cruel ! ah, quel nouveau prestige ! 
Connais-tu quelque dieu qui fasse un tel prodige 1 

MAHOMET. 

J'en connais un puissant, et toujours ecoute, 
Qui te parle avec moi. 

ZOPIRE. 

Qui? 

MAHOMET. 

La necessite. 
Ton inter^t. 



74 THE GREEN BOOK. 

ZOPIRE. 

Ere by such a tie we're bound, 
Let dying nature heaven and hell confound ! 
Int'rest thy God hath been and Justice 'mine* 
Can two such foes in amity combine ? 
But, if such hated friendship thou canst seek, 
What are the terms of such a friendship ? speak ! 
Is it thy slaughtered son, this arm hath killed ? 
Is it my children's blood, thy hands have spilled ? 

MAHOMET. 

Thy children ! yes ; attend while I make known 
A secret thou couldst learn from me alone ; 
Those dear-loved objects of thy long regret, 
The children of thy heart, are living yet ! 

ZOPIRE. 

They live ! oh blissful hour ! oh happy day ! 
My children living ! living ! dost thou say ? 
And 'tis from thee the joyful news I hear ! 

MAHOMET. 

Reared in my camp, they serve my power, Zopire ! 



ZOPIRE. 

Avant qu'un tel noeud nous rassemble, 
Les enfers et les cieux seront unis ensemble. 
L'interet est ton dieu, le mien est fequite ; 
Entre ces ennemis il n'est point de traite. 
Quel serait le ciment, reponds-moi, si tu I'oses, 
De I'horrible amitie qu'ici tu me proposes 1 
Reponds ; est-ce ton ills que mon bras te ravit 1 
Est-ce le sang des miens que ta main repandit I 

MAHOMET. 

Oui, ce sont tes fils meme. Oui, connais un mystere 
Dont seul dans I'univers je suis depositaire : 
Tu pleures tes enfans, ils respirent tous deux. 

ZOPIRE. 

Ils vivraient ! qu'as-tu dit 1 6 ciel ! 6 jour heureux ! 
lis vivraient ! c'est de toi qu'il faut que je I'apprenne ! 

MAHOMET. 

Eleves dans mon camp, tous deux sont dans ma chaiue. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 75 

ZOPIRE. 

My children serve ! my children slaves to thee ! 

MAHOMET. 

Were not their helpless lives preserved by me ? 

ZOPIRE. 

What ! have they never felt thy vengeful ire ? 

MAHOMET. 

I scorned through them to crush their guilty sire ! 

ZOPIRE. 

Proceed ; inform me of their present state ? 

MAHOMET. 

I hold the trembling balance of their fate ; 
One word will save, will yield it to thy hand. 

ZOPIRE. 

I save them — oh ! what price dost thou demand ? 
With joy my life, my liberty receive ! 

MAHOMET. 

No ; teach the world in Mahomet to believe — 



ZOPIRE. 

Mes enfans dans tes fers ! ils pourraient te servir ! 

MAHOMET. 

Mes bienfesantes mains ont daigne les nourrir. 

ZOPIRE. 

Quoi ! tu n'as point sur eux etendu ta colere 1 

MAHOMET. 

Je ne les punis point des fautes de leur pere. 

ZOPIRE. 

Acheve, eclaircis-moi, parle, quel est leur sort 1 

MAHOMET. 

Je tiens entre mes mains et leur vie et leur mort ; 
Tu n'as qu' a dire un mot, et je t'en fais I'arbitre. 

ZOPIRE. 

Moi ! je puis les sauver ! a quel prix 1 a quel titre 1 
Faut-il donner mon sang 1 faut'il porter leurs fers 1 

MAHOMET. 

Non, mais il faut m'aider a tromper I'univers ; 



76 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Desert thy gods, surrender Mecca now ; 

In public thy pretended faith avow ; 

And preach the trembling crowd, the Koran given 

To Mahomet, as the messenger of heaven. 

Refuse me this — 'tis useless to implore — 

Consent — thy long-lost son I'll then restore — 

And with my own thy daughter's fate combine — 

ZOPIRE. 

Mahomet ! a parent's tender heart is mine ; 

For thrice five years I ne'er have ceased to mourn 

My children, from this aged bosom torn ; 

For thrice five years my warmest prayer hath been, 

In their loved arms to quit this earthly scene ; 

But if no choice remain, but to betray 

My country, Mahomet, to thy impious sway, 

Or, with this hand, to stab my children, know, 

A father's hand would give the deadly blow ! 

No more ! 

MAHOMET, [solus.) 

Proud citizen, fierce old man, Til be 
More proud, more fierce, more pitiless than thee. 

December lOth, 1830. 



II faut rendre la Mecque, abandonner ton temple, 
De la credulite donner a tous I'exemple, 
Annoncer I'Alcoran aux peuples eflrayes, 
Me servir en prophete, et tomber a mes pieds 
Je te rendrai ton fils, et je serais ton gendre. 

ZOPIRE. 

Mahomet, je suis pere, et je porte un coeur tendre. 
Apres quinze ans d'ennuis, retrouver mes enfans, 
Les revoir, et mourir dans leurs embrassemens, 
C'est le premier des biens pour mon ame attendrie : 
Mais s'il faut a ton culte asservir ma patrie, 
Ou de ma propre main les immoler tous deux, 
Connais-moi, Mahomet, mon choix n'est pas douteux. 
Adieu. 

MAHOMET. (^SeuL) 

Fier citoyen, vieillard inexorable, 
Je serai plus que toi cruel, impitoyable. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 77 



DEAR ISLE OF MY BIRTH, ERE I SAIL FROM THY 

SHORES. 

I. 

Dear isle of my birth, ere I sail from thy shores, 
In the banquet's wild glow I will try to subdue 

The thought I leave her whom my bosom adores— 
Yet, in silence, as if to affection untrue. 

II. 

In silence, as if to affection untrue — 

For vain were this fevered emotion to quell 

The throb of the heart, in its lingering adieu, 
The frenzy of love, in its burning farewell. 

III. 

And thou, my adored one ! thou never wilt know 
Of all I have felt, yet of all I repressed ; 

Though earth, without thee, hath no joy to bestow, 
I love thee too deeply to seek to be blest. 

IV. 

Were thy lot to be linked through existence to mine, 
To possess such a heart were Elysium to me ; 

But, though in distraction that hope to resign, 
I submit — for alas ! 'twould be ruin to thee. 

V. 

'Twould be ruin — ah. Fortune ! why hast thou refused 
To join two fond hearts death alone could divide, 

But a pittance from all by the worthless abused. 
In the revels of vice, or the trappings of pride ? 

VI. 

Oh! could we believe that Futurity's doom 

Were the dream of the fool, or the tale of the knave- 
How sweet were the refuge from thought in the tomb ! 
How blest the repose of despair in the grave ! 



78 THE GREEN BOOK. 

EPIGRAM, 

On a ruby-visaged friend, rather partial to Ms tumbler. 

Whoever, my friend, sees thy nose clad in scarlet, 
Like the lady our clergy call Babylon's harlot. 
Learns more than from all the philosophers' chatter, 
How visibly spirit may act upon matter, 

March SOthy 1829. 



TRANSLATION FROM LUCAN'S PHARSALIA. 

Book IX, 



Cato and Labienus, having collected the remains of the Roman 
republicans after the battle of Pharsalia, arrive in Africa, to continue the 
war against Caesar, and march, for that purpose, across the burning 
deserts of Lybia called the Syrtes, to join their ally Juba, king of Mauri- 
tania. On their way, they reach the celebrated temple and oracle of 
Jupiter Ammon, when Labienus asks Cato to consult the god on the 
event of the civil war] This occasions Cato's lofty reply, deservedly 
pronounced by Blair to be the "finest specimen of the moral sublime in 
all antiquity." Then follows an equally appropriate and noble eulogium 
of Cato by the poet. 



Now towards the shrine the wearied Romans came. 
Sacred to Jove, here known by Ammon's name. 
Far from all other fanes the structure stands, 
Amid the dreary Garamantian sands : 
Not, as in Rome, the sire of gods is seen. 
With human form and man's majestic mien; 
No brandished hand the forky thunder rears. 
But a ram's head and wreathed horns he wears. 



Ventum erat ad templum, Libycis quod gentibus unum 
Inculti Garamantes habent: stat corniger illic 
lupiter, ut memorant, sed non aut t''ulmina vibrans, 
Aut similis nostro, sed tortis cornibus, Ammon. 
Non illic Libycse posuerunt ditia gentes 
Templa ; nee Eois splendent donoria gemmis. 
Quamvis -^thiopum populis, Araburaque beatis 



THE GREEN BOOK. 79 

Though ^Ethiopia's tribes his godhead own, 

Though rich Arabia bows to him alone, 

And to the farthest Ind' no other Jove is known, 

Here ancient poverty so strictly reigns — 

No gaudy pomp the soul's pure worship stains ; 

No costly spoil from guilty greatness shines ; 

No useless gold, nor gems from Asian mines ; 

And Heaven, that simple virtue still befriends, 

From Roman wealth the sacred shrine defends. 

■:^ -^ * ;^ * -* i^ * ^ 

From Eastern lands, before the lofty gate, 

A crowd, to learn the god's decisions, wait ; 

Who, when the Roman leader^ they survey, 

Yield, with respect, before the hero's way. 

Here Cato's friends, with anxious hope inspired, 

On every side the virtuous chief required — 

Since to a temple so renowned they came, 

To learn if heavenly truth or empty fame, 

Had o'er the world diffused its wondrous name ? 

But Labienus, far above the rest. 

With eager warmth unites in the request. 

That Cato's self should hear their doom revealed, 

As yet within the womb of time concealed. 

" Chance and our lucky rout," the warrior said, 

*' To Ammon's fane our wanderincr host has led. 

What like its awful counsel can instruct ? 

What o'er the Syrts' our burning march conduct? 



Gentibus, atque Indis unus sit lupiter Ammon, 
Pauper adhuc Deus est, nullis violata per 2evum 
Divitiis delubra tenens : morumque priorum 

Numen Romano templum defendit ab auro. 

* *'* * » * * « # 

Stabant ante fores populi, quos miserat Eos, 
Cornigerique lovis monitu nova fata petebant : 
Sed Latio cessere duci ; comitesque Catonem 
Grant, exploret Libycum memorata per orbem 
Numina, de fama tarn longi iudicet sevi. 
Maximus hortator scrutandi voce Deorum 
Eventus Labienus erat : . . . . 

sors obtulit, inquit, 

Et fortuna viaB, tarn magni numinis ora, 
Consiliumque Dei : tanto duce possumus uti 

» Cato. 



80 THE GREEN BOOK. 

What the dire war's uncertain turns can tell? 

What can unfold its dark result so well ? 

And whose — if not to Cato's hallowed prayer, 

Will heavenly powers their secret thoughts declare? 

God in thy heart, illustrious sage, resides, 

In every dictate of thy mind presides ; 

And spodess virtue, from thy earliest years. 

In every action of thy life appears. 

Then, since the occasion seems prepared for thee, 

Inquire the will of the Divinity ; 

Inquire usurping Caesar's certain doom, "* 

And learn the final destiny of Rome ; 

Learn, if the people shall their rights regain. 

And liberty and ancient justice reign ; 

Or if, to free the world, we vainly strive, 

And every field Pharsalia must revive ? 

And, while the God complies with thy request, 

Since warmest love of virtue fires thy breast, 

Demand, how erring man may know her laws. 

And follow Truth and Honour's sacred cause? 

Full of th' inspiring Deity, enshrin'd 
In the pure temple of his lofty mind, 
Cato this superstitious counsel spurned, 
And to the chief sublimely thus returned ; 
" What, Labienus, would'st thou have me seek, 
Whether I choose a tyrant's yoke to break ? 
Whether I choose to live with infamy. 
Or die with glory, struggling to be free ? 



Per Syrtes, bellique datos cognoscere casus. 

Nam cui crediderim Superos arcana daturos 

Dicturosque magis, quam sancto vera Catonil 

Certe vita tibi semper directa supernas 

Ad leges, sequirisque Deum : datur ecce loquendi 

Cum love lil)ertas: inquire in fata nefandi 

Caesaris, et patriae ventures excute mores: 

lure suo populis uti iegumque licebit, 

An bellum civile perit: .... 

tua pectora sacra 
Voce reple : durae saltern virtutis amator 
Quasre quid est virtus, et posce exemplar honesti 7 

Ille Deo plenus, tacita quern mente gerebat, 
Effudit dignas adytis e pectore voces. 
Quid quaeri Labiene iubes ] an liber in armis 
Occubuisse velim potius, quam regna videre ? 



THE GREEN BOOK. 81 

If 'tis beneath the noble spirit's care, 

For mere old age, a worthless life to spare ; 

If, though the arm of impious power assail, 

That arm against the good can ne'er avail ; 

If fortune's threatening malice ne'er can force 

Triumphant virtue from her sovereign course ; 

If, though we view our hopes by fate o'erthrown. 

We still should follow — what is right alone ; 

If great designs, in honour's sacred cause, 

Though vanquished, not the less deserve applause ; 

This, this we want no Ammon to impart — 

This, this we feel inscribed on every heart ! 

Man owes his being to th' omniscient will — 

What, though the voice of oracles were still, 

Is he less bound Heaven's purpose to fulfil ? 

And shall the God that formed all Nature, then 

Need by vain words explain his law to men ? 

No ! from the hour of reason's glorious birth, 

Conscience points out the path to all on earth! 

Think'st thou, that Being limits his commands 

To a few wandering tribes and barren sands ? 

Think'st thou th' Eternal Truth, that knows no bound, 

That fills the ocean, earth, and air around, 

In dreary deserts can alone be found ? 

Why should we seek the Deity afar? 

God is where'er we look, where'er we are; 

Or, if th' Almighty Mind can ever rest. 

His noblest dwelling is the virtuous breast ! 



An sit vita nihil, sed longam difFerat aetas ? 
An noceat vis ulla bono 1 Fortunaque perdat 
Opposita virtute minas 1 laudandaque velle 
Sit satis, ...... 

. et nunquam successu crescat honestum 1 
Scimus, et hoc nobis non altius inserit Ammon. 
Nil facimus non sponte Dei : nee vocibus ullis 
Numen eget; dixitique semel nascentibus auctor 
Quicquid scire licet ; steriles nee legit arenas, 
Ut canerat paucis, mersitque hoc pulvere verum : 
Estne Dei sedes nisi terra, et pontus, et aer, 
Et coelum, et virtus'? Superos quid quserimus ultra] 
lupiter est quodcunque vides, quocunque moveris. 



82 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Let those, who tremble at futurity, 

To doubtful oracles for counsel flee — 

For me it is alone enough to know, 

Timid or brave, Death waits on all below. 

This Heaven hath willed — shall we that will explore ? 

This God hath fixed — and man can learn no more." 

Thus said, and turning from the crowd aside, 
Who on the Lybian god for aid relied, 
Illustrious Cato from the shrine withdrew. 
Leaving their worship to the vulgar crew. 

Bearing his weighty arms in his own hands, 
First of his panting host he treads the scorching sands ; 
Nor, with commands, but with example, leads ; 
Teaching them patience not by words, but deeds. 
Ne'er in a litter is he seen to loll ; 
Ne'er in a chariot lazily to roll ; 
But, yielding last to rest, he wakes the first. 
Nor le&s resists the burning rage of thirst. 
When the tired army in these parching plains, 
Maddened with drought, by chance a streamlet gains. 
He waits till even the meanest slave hath quaffed. 
Nor tastes, till all have drunk, his scanty draught ! 
If but the good, the truly good may claim 
The purest tribute of immortal fame ; 
If virtue, that no suffering can depress. 
Be virtue, independent of success ; 
The deeds that won our fathers' highest praise, 
Rome's brightest exploits in her happiest days, 



Sortilegis egeant dubii, semperque futuris 
Casibus ancipites : me non oracula certum, 
Sed mors certa facit : pavido fortique cadendum est. 
Hoc satis est dixisse lovem. Sic ille profatur : 
Servataque fide templi, discedit ab aris 
Non exploratum populis Ammona reliquens. 
Ipse manu sua pila gerens, praecedit anheli 
Militis ora pedes ; monstrat tolerare labores, 
Non jubet; et nulla vehitur cervice supinus, 
Carpentove sedens; somni parcissimus ipse est, 
Ultimus haustor aquae :...., 
cum tandem fonte reperto, 
Indiga cogatur latices potare iuventus, 
Stat, dum lixa bibat. Si veris magna paratur 
Fama bonis, et si successu nuda remoto 



THE GREEN BOOK. 83 

Seem the mere acts of Fortune's power alone, 
Before the god-Hke worth by Cato shown ! 
What victory o'er proudest reahns obtained, 
What conquest by the blood of nations stained, 
Where chance with valour boasts an equal share, 
To Cato's firm affliction can compare ? 
This noble triumph of thy patient toil. 
On the last verge of Lybia's fiery soil, 
Cato ! with thee far sooner would I lead. 
Far sooner through the burning Syrts' proceed, 
Than thrice, oh Pompey ! in thy chariot ride 
To the high Capitol in conquering pride ! 
Or gain, oh Marius ! all thy glory gained. 
From Afric quelled, and fierce Jugurtha chained! 
Here, Rome ! his country's real father see. 
Worthiest of altars and of shrines from thee ! 
If e'er thou stand'st erect — thy fetters broke — 
If e'er thou freest thy neck from Slavery's yoke. 
Ne'er shalt thou blush to swear by Cato's name. 
But midst thy gods the virtuous chief proclaim ! 

September 29thy 1836. 



Inspicitur Virtus, quicquid laudamasin ullo 
Maiorum fortuna fuit : quis Marte secundo, 
Quis tantum meruit populorum sanguine nomen 1 
Hunc ego per Syrtes Libysque extrema triumphum 

Ducere maiuerim, 

quam ter Capitolia curru 

Scandere Pompeii, quam frangere colla lugurthse. 
Ecce parens verus patriae, dignissimus aris 
Roma tuis ; per quern nunquam iurare pudebit, 
Et quem, si steteris unquam cervice soluta, 
Tunc dim factura deum.* 

* From the text of the Poetae Latini Veteres — Florentiae, typis losephi 
Moliniy ad siguni Dantis, m. dccc. xxix. 



84 THE GREEN BOOK. 

The whole of this passage from Lucan is deserving of the very 
highest admiration; and in this spirit it has heen translated. Consi- 
dering that the author of the Phfirsalia was put to death when only 
seven-and-twenty, the translator cannot help looking upon him as a 
poet that is too little read and admired. This was not the case in an- 
tiquity, as may be seen from the Genethllacon Lucan i of Statius, (St/lv, 
ii. 7,) and the more concise and unequivocal testimony of Martial. {Epi- 
gram, xiv. 194.) 

Lucanus. 
Sunt quidam, qui me dicunt non esse poetam: 
Sed, qui me vendit, bibliopola pulat. 

That I am not a poet, some people will tell me — 
But the booksellers think that I am^ for they sell me. 

Indeed, there is a glorious Dry den ism about Lucan that gives a glow 
to the mind which makes us pardon all his faults, when we reflect, that 
though he died so young, he was not only the author of the Pharsalia, 
but of several other long works, which have perished in the wreck of 
ancient learning. What a poet could he have been, had he lived and 
written up to fifty-two, the age of that plodding methodizer of harmo- 
nious plagiarism, whose overrated centos of varnished thefts it has pleased 
some critics to place above the originality of Homer and Theocritus! — 
There is more of the noble aqua vifas of really vigorous and independ- 
ent thought in one page of Lucan's pike poetry, then in all the compa- 
ratively tame, conservative compositions of Virgil. The splendid sym- 
pathy of the young poet, with the high-minded and self-devoted, though 
unsuccessful, champions of freedom, " reminds one," as Shiel would say, 
"of many things !" 

Weep on — perhaps, in after days, 

They'll learn to love your name; 
W^hen many a deed shall wake in praise ! 

That now must sleep in blame ! 
And when they tread the ruined isle ! 

Where rest, at length, the lord and slave, 
They'll wondering ask, how hands so vile 

Could conquer hearts so braye 1 — Moore. 



i^" 



THE GREEN BOOK. 85 

NAY, DO NOT TELL ME, WHEN WE MEET. 

I. 

Nay, do not tell me, when me meet, 

Thou art so happy and so glad — 
No words to me can be more sweet, 

Yet none have made my soul more sad. 

II. 

No words can be more sweet to me — 

For is it not a bliss to know, 
That one, who would be all to thee, 

Can happiness on thee bestow ? 

III. 

No words have made my soul more sad — 
For, though our hearts were formed to twine, 

I feel with hopeless anguish mad. 
To think — thou never canst be mine. 

IV. 

It is not, that thou would st thyself 

Consent to wed for lands or gold ; 
But parents only look to pelf. 

And Beauty thus is bought and sold. 

V. 

Yet why, this object o^ their choice, 

Do / thus venture to arraign. 
Who can not, must not, raise my voice, 

And dare not act, to break thy chain ? 

VI. 

For mine must be the Spartan's pangs, 

Resolved his agony to hide — 
He felt his hidden captive's fangs, 

But bore the torture — till he died. 

VII. 

Ev'n so, the anguish / sustain 

Must in eternal silence rest — 
Cease, cease to throb, my burning brain ! 

Be calm, be calm, my bleeding breast ! 
January iih, 1837. 



86 THE GREEN BOOK. 



THE DUCHESS OF BERRI AND THE JEW. 



"The Jew, Deutz, who was ennobled in Italy, and is believed at 
Paris to be the father of the Duchess of Berri's infant, is described as an 
ill-favoured wretch, with sunken and blood-shot eyes, dark hair, like 
horse hair, horribly bad teeth, and features deeply indented with the 
small-pox." — Examiner, 



Said Dick to Ned the other day, " 

When he had finished reading 
This sketch of Deutz, whom Berri proved 

To be a " man of ^reec/mg*,"— 
" I think the Duchess, in one sense, 

May justly be reviled. 
For choosing such an ugly wretch 

As father for a child ; 
But, further, we should blame her not, 

Since, ugly though he be. 
She may have loved the Hebrew as 

A real Jew cV esprit, ^^ — 
" Alas 1" cried Ned, " I'm much afraid 

The Duchess' fame is o'er ; 
For all th' esprit she could have liked 

Was his — ESPRIT du corps !"^ 

March, 1833. 

^ The whole of the Duchess of Berri's case, in reference to the inop- 
portune little intruder, whose semi-parentage is involved in such disedi- 
fying obscurity, is best summed up by the able editor of the Dublin 
Evening Post. "Her Royal Highness," says the sagacious journalist, 
" being great with child, has formally announced that she was married 
in Italy, She has been ten months in Fuance. Rather distressing 
for a heroine !" 



THE GREEN BOOK. 87 



STANZAS. 



"A hollow agony which will not heal." — Byrox. 



I. 

I LOOK around — I look around — life has no cliarm for me — 

There is a pang in all I feel — a blight o'er all I see — 

In vain may joy around me glow, or summer o'er me 

shine — 
There is no glance that fondly beams — no heart that throbs 

to mine. 

II. 

Amid the bustling crowd I seek to lull within my breast 
Affection's thirsting tenderness, that cannot, will not rest — 
For oh ! where'er I turn 'tis but in ceaseless gloom to pine — 
To meet no glance that fondly beams — no heart that throbs 
to mine. 

III. 

Again, in peaceful scenes, I try my restless soul to calm — 
I fly to friendship, wisdom's page, and music's soothing 

balm — 
But friendship, wisdom, music's voice, in vain their aid 

combine — 
They bring no glance that fondly beams — no heart that 

throbs to mine. 

IV. 

And yet there is one gentle form — but why that thought 

recall ? 
The nectar draught that Love had filled by Fate is turned 

to gall — 
Those days of hope — that last fond night — to Memory's 

tomb consign — 
The glance that beamed, the heart that throbbed, can ne'er 

on earth be mine. 

October 3d, 1838. 



88 THE GREEN BOOK. 



PIKES versus PIKE ! 

Suggested by a passage from the speech of a Mr. Pike, of the Metro- 
pa lit an Conservative Society , in favour of the Orange Corporation 
of Dublin, 



" One good turn deserves another." — Old Proverb, 



In a late Tory clique, cried a spouter called Pike — 

(An odd sort of name for such gentry to like !) 

" Precursor's a ' runner before,' it is said ; 

And if Dan, their great chief, his ' two millions' will head, 

We'll find them all real Precursors, Til promise — 

For we ' Protestant boys' would soon make them run 

from us 1" 
Now, to gain a '« hear, hear," Mr. Pike, this is well ; 
Nay, ev'n to elicit a " cheer," it may tell ; 
But I rather suspect, if you'd risk an attack, 
WE'd have pikes in our front, and a pike in your back. 

December 23d, 1838. 



WAR SONG OF THE IRISH BARDS BEFORE THE BATTLE 
OF CLONTARF. 



*' Tempora mutantur et nos mutamur in illis.'' 



The memorable battle of Clontarf was fought on Good Friday, the 
23d of April, 1014, between the combined armies of Leinster and Den- 
mark, and the forces of Munster, CTonnaught, and Ulster. The great 
opulence of Ireland, under the excellent administration of Brian Boru, 
by whom she was recovered from all her misfortunes and restored to her 
ancient prosperity, tempted the Danes to seize on the favourable oppor- 
tunity which the revolt of Maolmorda, king of Leinster, afforded them, 
to settle permanently in the country, and divide it among themselves, 
as they had long intended. For this purpose, they took their families 
on board their fleet, and determined, as far as possible, to exterminate 
the Milesians. But being convinced, by the bloody and unsuccessful 
experience of more than two centuries, how difficult this enterprise 
would prove, the Danes collected the bravest warriors from their own 



THE GREEN BOOK. 89 

country, Sweden, Norway, Normandy, Britain, the Hebrides, the Ork- 
neys, the Shetland Islands, and the Isle of Man. The command of 
these troops was intrusted by Canute to his High-Admiral Broder, a 
bold and experienced officer of royal blood, with orders, however, to act 
under Maolmorda, who, upon his junction with those formidable rein- 
forcements, was at the head of 60,000 men. The Milesian army, 
owing to the absence of a considerable body of South Munster forces, 
did not amount to 30,000 men. They were led to action hy Murrough, 
the eldest son of the illustrious Brian, who, though he was in his 88th 
year, is described by our old annalists, as riding through the ranks of 
his countrymen, with a crucifix in one hand and his golden-hilted sword 
in the other, exhorting them to do their duty; after which, notwith- 
standing his great age, he was, with much difficulty, prevailed upon to 
retire to his tent. There he waited the result of the day in prayer, be- 
fore the emblem of his suffering Redeemer, having nobly determined, in 
case of a defeat, to perish with his whole race, whom, to the number of 
three sons, his brave grandson Turlough, aged only fifteen, and fifteen 
nephews, he had led to oppose the inveterate enemies of his country 
and religion. The conflict commenced at sun-rise and continued till 
late in the evening, when, after one of the most desperately-fought en- 
gagements recorded in history, the Northmen were totally routed. 
Their loss amounted to between 14,000 and 16,000 men, including a 
chosen band of 1,000 Danish veterans, cased in heavy armour from 
head to foot. Amongst the slain were Maolmorda, Broder, Charles and 
Henry, two Norwegian princes, Dolat, Conmaol, and Plait, three emi- 
nent Scandinavian champions, and Sigurd, the potent and martial Earl 
of Orkney — an extensive feudal and piratical sovereignty, embracing, at 
its most flourishing period, the Orkneys, the Hebrides, the Shetland 
Islands, the Isle of Man, the three northern counties of Scotland, and 
large possessions in Inverness and Argyleshires, as well as in Ireland. 
But this glorious victory was dearly purchased by the deaths of Brian, 
the Alfred, and Murrough, in strength and valour (though not in in- 
vulnerability) the Achilles of his country; Turlough, the monarch's 
gallant grandson ; the brave Sitric, prince of Ulster : the warlike thanes 
or earls of Lennox and Mar, who, as the descendants of the same ances- 
tors, came to assist Brian against the common foes of Ireland and Scot- 
land ; many other distinguished princes and nobles, and from four to 
seven thousand men. It is rather remarkable, that although the Eng- 
lish Saxons were completely subjugated, about this period, by the Danish 
kings Sweyn and his son Canute the Great, yet the Milesian Irish en- 
tirely defeated the numerous and elsewhere invincible armies of those 
princes, aided, as such formidable invaders were, by the powerful alli- 
ance of Leinster.' 



^ O'Halloran's Hist, of Ireland, book xi. chap. 8. ; Lanigan's Eccles. 
Hist, of Ireland, vol. iii. chap, xxiii. sect. 9 to 11 ; Vallancey's Col- 
lectanea, vol. I. p. 536 to 643. 

8 



90 THE GREEN BOOK, 



Sons of Erin, march on — grasp your swords, shields, and 
lances — 
Whirl around the swift sling — draw the death-shafted 
bow— • 
And spur the bold steed, that impatiently prances 
To trample in slaughter the bands of the foe — 
For see ! o'er your lines. 
How gloriously shines 
The «' SUN-BURST,"^ resplendently blazing on high ! 
And a thousand harps sound 
Their loud notes around. 
That call on the valiant to conquer or die ! 

11. 

On, on, to the charge — Lochlin's chiefs set in motion, 

Her myriads from Alba^ to Thyle's icy shore ;^ 
But, though countless, the waves of that vast raging ocean 
Shall meet with the rocks they've been dashed from 
before : 

Maolmorda may bring, 
'Gainst his country and king. 
Yon barbarous invaders that darken the field ; 
Their glory, ere night, 
Shall vanish in flight, 
For Freedom's our spear and Religion our shield, 

* The signal for engaging, among the ancient Irish, was given by 
elevating the royal standard, called Gall-grenay or the " blazing-sun." 
Bright waving from its staff on air, 

Gall-grena high was raised, 
With gems that Indians wealth declare, 
In radiant pomp it blazed. 
Miss Brooke^ s Reliques of Ancient Irish Poetry^ p. 58. 

2 "The word Alba, not Albin, is the Irish name for Scotland." — 
O^Reilly, Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy, vol. xvi. part ii. 
p, 186. 

3 Thule, or Iceland, according to the opinion of many eminent authori- 
ties, was well known to, and visited by, the Irish, even so early as the 
fifth century. They called it Inis-Thyle, the island of Thyle. — See 
Lanigan, Eccles, Hist, vol i. p» 401, and vol. iii. p, 220, and 224 
to 228. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 91 

III. 

Hark ! that wide-clashing signal ! — the foe calls on Odin ! — * 
(Grim fiend, on whose altars what thousands have bled !)^ 
But Erin still boasts the same valour that glowed in 
Her sons, when by Brian to victory led : 

'Tis true, that no more 

The king we adore 
Can lead us, to scatter the Infidel's might; 

Yet is Murrough not here ? 

And, what heart can know fear, 
While that «' sword of his country" is brandished in fight? 

IV. 

In vain, to his chieftains, dark Broder engages 

To give thy green fields to the plundering Dane ;^ 

Beloved island of heroes, of saints and of sages ! 
Thou never shalt crouch to a conqueror's chain ! 

' Mallet, speaking of the ancient Scandinavians, says, " When they 
were going to join battle, they raised great shouts, they clashed their 
arnris together, they invoked v^ith a great noise the name of Odin, and 
sometimes sung hymns in his praise." — Nurthern AntiquitieSy vol, i. 
chap. ix. p, 237. 

'^ For an account of the human sacrifices of the Heathen Danes, Nor- 
wegians, and Swedes, see Mallet, vol. i. chap. vii. p. 132 to 139. 

2 The following vivid and characteristic description of the famous 
Broder, who slew the monarch Brian, is literally translated from an old 
Scandinavian annalist. " Broder, after having embraced Christianity, 
and having been advanced even to deacon's orders, had apostatized, and, 
turning a blasphemer of God, became a worshipper of the deities of the 
Gentiles. He far surpassed every other person in the knowledge of 
magic, and, when arrayed in military armour, he was able to ward off 
any weapon. Moreover, he was of great stature and powerful strength ; 
and his hair, the black colour of which darkened his countenance, he 
wore of such a length that he could have covered it with his belt.'* — 
(Johnstone^s Antiquitates Celto-Scandicse, p. 1 1 3.) Of the sanguinary 
and rapacious resolution of the Pagan Danes, in case of success, with 
regard to the Milesian Irish, the following account is given from a Latin 
chronicle of a contemporary French writer, Ademar, a monk of St. Epar- 
chius of Angouleme. "About this period," says the annalist, " the North- 
men already mentioned, undertaking an enterprise, the victorious con- 
clusion of which their forefathers never presumed upon, invaded, with 
an innumerable fleet, and accompanied with their wives, their children, 
and their Christian captives, whom they reduced to be their slaves, the 
island Hibernia, likewise called Irlanda, in order that, the Irish beixg 

EXTERMINATED, THEY MIGHT COLONIZE THAT MOST OPULENT COUN- 
TRY FOR THEMSELVES.'* — Lubbc, JSov, Bibl, 3ISS, libr. torn, 2, ap, 
LanigaUy Eccks, Hist, vol, iii. p, 423. 



92 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Our fathers defied, 

And humbled the pride 
Of Rome's haughty legions that vanquished the world ;* 

Then, Canute ! send forth 

All the powers of the North ! 
Thy spell-w^oven raven to earth shall be hurled !^ 

V. 

Oh thou! who this day upon Calvary suspended, 

Expired on the cross for the sins of mankind ; 
Oh thou! who when ruin o'er Israel impended. 

From five mio^htv monarchs for veno^eance combined, 

Caused the sun to stand still. 

O'er Gibeon's bright hill, 
Till the hosts of the Gentile lay writhing in dust ;^ 

Then, Lord ! let thy name 

Fill yon Heathens with shame. 
For in thee is our refuge, our hope, and our trust ! 

' According^ to the combined testimony of Irish and Roman history, 
the numerous defeats and final expulsion of the " lords of the world" 
from Britain, were chiefly attributable to the valour of the Irish, then 
styled Scots, in conjunction with their dependent allies, the Picts. Op- 
posed to their united attack, the enormous barrier of the Roman wall, 
which stretched from sea to sea across the island, proved unavailing; 
and, while their Saxon confederates ravaged the coasts of England by 
sea, the Scots and Picts extended their predatory incursions through the 
interior of the province. Nor are the maritime invasions of Britain and 
Gaul by several of the ancient kings of Ireland — especially those of 
Crimthan or Criomthan I., Nial the Great, and Dalhy — less celebrated. 
— See 0' Conor's Introduction to Dissertations on the History of Ire- 
land, sect. xiv. p. 23. 

2 The ensign of the ancient Danes was a raven. On the defeat of 
Hubba, the Dane, in the reign of the great Alfred, Hume relates that 
Oddune, Earl of Devonshire, captured " the famous Reafen, or enchanted 
standard, in which the Danes put great confidence. It contained the 
figure of a raven, which had been enwoven by the three sisters of Hin- 
guar and Hubba, with many magical incantations, and which, by its 
different movements, prognosticated, as the Danes believed, the good or 
bad success of any enterprise." The same ill-omened bird continued to 
be the Danish ensign in the age of Brian Boru. " At their disembarka- 
tion on the English coast," says M. Thierry, of Sweyn's successful ex- 
pedition against England, "the Danes, formed into battalions, displayed 
a banner of white silk, in the centre of which was embroidered a raven 
opening his beak and spreading his wings." — Hist, of the Norman 
Conquest, vol. i.p. 136. 

^ Joshua, chap. x. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 93 

VI. 

Sons of Erin, march on — grasp your swords, shields, and 
lances — 
Whirl around the swift sling, draw the death-shafted 
bow — 
And spur the bold steed, that impatiently prances 
To trample in slaughter the bands of the foe — 
For see ! o'er your lines, 
How gloriously shines 
The " SUN-BURST," resplendently blazing on high ! 
And a thousand harps sound 
Their loud notes around. 
That call on the valiant to conquer or die ! 

January lOtk, 1829. 



FAREWELL TO MY BOOK. 



Here goes for a swim on the stream of old Time, 
On those buoyant supporters, the bladders of rhyme! 
If our weight breaks them down, and we sink in the flood, 
We are sraother'd, at least, in respectable mud. — Btrgn. 



My dear little volume, it seems you are grown 

Old enough, as they say, for a will of your own ; 

And, no longer content to be kept for the pleasure 

Of myself, or a friend, in our moments of leisure, 

You wish, though the danger of print I've foretold, 

To aim at a suit of morocco and gold. 

Well, take your own way, since no effort can stop 

Your rage to be seen in the bookseller's shop. 

But, as soon as yourself and your parent are slandered, 

In the Mail, and the Packet, the Times, and the Standard; 

Magazines and reviews all unite to decry you, 

And others, to still meaner uses, apply you ;^ 

1 From dusty shops neglected authors come, 
Martyrs of pies, &c. — DnYDEjr. 
8* 



94 THE GREEN BOOK. 

You'll think on the silly career you have run, 
And, comparing yourself with the prodigal son, 
Lament that you cannot, like him, to your cost, 
By repentance regain what by folly you lost. 
Yet why thus debate? since my warning you mock, 
Like your brother in rashness, the obstinate cock. 
Who, laughing at all his good parent could tell, 
Disobeyed her advice, and was drowned in the well. 
Then go — but when Edinburgh's critic appears. 
Beneath ev'ry slice of whose merciless shears 
The '' membra disjecta poetae" are lopped. 
As Melanthius of old by Ulysses was cropped, ^ 
Like Hassan, the Persian, when cursing the day 
That led hiin from Shiraz through deserts to stray,^ 
With feelings of deep but unpitied regret. 
You'll wish you remained in my custody yet. 

January, 1839. 

^ See the Odyssey, book xxii. v. 510, &c., by Pope, whose modest 
paraphrase of the original Greek is preferable to the more literal indeli- 
cacy of Cowper's version. 

2 Sad was the hour, and luckless was the day, 
When first from Shiraz' walls I bent my way ! 

CoLLiNs's Hassan, or the Camel-Driver* 



POSTSCRIPTS 



95 



POSTSCUIPT 



TO 



"DR. SOUTHEY'S EPISTLE TO THE AUTHOR OF 
THE PARSON'S HORN-BOOK." 



Reasons for the necessity of substituting state-supported churches in 
every country by the " voluntary system," and more particularly in 
Ireland — Origin of the general diffusion of hostility to the Irish 
Church and tithe-system by the formation of the society of the origi- 
nal Comet Club, and the publication of the Parson's Horn-Book and 
Comet — Plan of operations against the Church adopted by the Club, 
and its great success — Prosecution and true causes of the extinction 
of the Comet — -Correction of the misinformation of the Quarterly 
Review respecting the two societies of the Comet Club and the Irish 
Brigade. 

If we ought to have any state system of religion, the 
best, perhaps, amongst so many conflicting sects, would be 
the Church of England, from its forming such a temperate 
and respectable medium between the opposite systems of 
authority and liberty ; from its combining so much of the 
dignified hierarchy, ceremonial and liturgy of Catholicity, 
with the greater simplicity and freedom of opinion connect- 
ed with Protestantism. But Christ and his apostles left 
Christianity to be supported by the contributions of those 
who chose to support it ; and, without dwelling on the 
superior deference necessarily due to their authority in 
religious matters, human experience and reason amply de- 
monstrate the propriety of not deviating from their exam- 
ple in this respect. The Christian Church, in the times of 
its greatest purity, or during the first three centuries, was 
solely maintained by voluntary contributions. From the 
period of its first connection with the state by Constantine, 
that purity began to decay. An Established Church, by 
exalting one sect of Christians in a nation above others, 
tends to promote pride or a sense and manifestation of supe- 

97 



98 THE GREEN BOOK. 

riority in the established sect and its priesthood, with feel- 
ings of inferiority and consequent discontent and envy 
amongst other sects — two states of mind destructive of the 
very essence of Christianity in all sects, even where such 
conflicting opinions do not lead, as at Skibbereen, Newtown- 
barry, Carrickshock, Wallstown, Moncoin, Bilboa, Carri- 
geen, Rathcormac, &lc. to still worse results, by producing 
positive bloodshed and the destruction of human life. Re- 
ligion, too, when connected with the state, will be dese- 
crated, by having its holy offices converted into the means of 
providing for court favourites, government partisans, or un- 
worthy members or dependants of aristocratic families, 
and by its exposing the clergy to the corruption and debase- 
ment of hunting after lay promotion or patronage. Thus, 
— without going back to the more ignorant or generally 
immoral periods in the history of state-church patronage, 
and confining our attention merely to that of France and 
England, as presenting the least equivocal examples of the 
equally pernicious tendencies of that system of clerical pro- 
motion, in a despotic and Catholic, as well as in a free and 
Protestant country, — it will be sufficient to instance, in 
France, the advancement by the Regent Duke of Orleans 
of the unprincipled Dubois, the companion of his infamous 
debaucheries, to an archbishopric and a cardinal's hat ; and 
to allude to the subsequent elevation, to the See of Autun, 
of the scarcely, if at all, less sanctified personage, Talley- 
rand. In England, the similarly demoralizing effects of an 
Established Church, not only upon minds of a common, 
but of a decidedly superior order, may be sufficiently illus- 
trated by the bribery of the late Duke of York's mistress, 

Mary Anne Clerk, by Doctor O , that he might, 

through her adulterous influence with the Duke, obtain leave 
to preach before royalty, in order to get a bishopric ; and 
by the following extract from the memoirs of the ortho- 
dox Hannah More. " I was dining," says that pious lady, 
" in a parliamentary party with Lord Castlereagh, and he 
produced for our amusement in the evening some volumes 

of original letters, curiously preserved by Lady C . 

Perhaps you know of, or have seen the collection, which 

her Ladyship derived from the Duchess of Suffolk, 

to whom they had all been addressed. When his Lordship 

showed us the index, my curiosity was immediately 

fixed by Doctor Young. I professed my enthusiastic ad- 



THE GREEN BOOK. 99 

miration of his ' Night Thoughts,' and begged to see and 
admire as a relic, the original letter of such a man. My 
request was immediately complied with, with a significant 
smile; and what had I the mortification to read? Horresco 
ref evens ! It was the most fawning, servile, mendicant 
letter, perhaps, that ever was penned by a clergyman, im- 
ploring the MISTRESS of George 11, to exert her interest 
for HIS preferment,'^'' Such are the natural, and, in a greater 
or lesser degree, the inevitable consequences, of connecting 
the ministers of a kingdom which is not of this world with 
those of the kingdoms which are ; consequences which, as 
they are produced by such a connection, so can they alone 
be adequately guarded against, by a total separation of the 
"things which are Caesar's" from the ''things which are 
God's." By such a separation, also, the heads of the 
different religions, w^ho ought to ''show forth their humility 
in all things," would be more effectually or completely 
severed, as Christ and his Apostles were, from such "pomps 
and vanities" as attendances at levees, drawing-rooms, or 
dinners, at the Castle in Dublin, or the Palace in London; 
fopperies of fashion, unsuited not only to the members of 
a Christian, but even of a Heathen hierarchy. Christ never 
appeared in the courts of viceroys or princes but when he 
was sent from Pilate to Herod, from Herod to Pilate, and 
from both to be crucified; and the emperor Julian the Apos- 
tate, in his description of the duty even of a Pagan priest, 

says — " The priest of the gods, if he sometimes 

visits the Palace, should appear only as the advocate 

of those who have vainly solicited either justice or mercy" 
—thus drawing a broad and proper line of distinction be- 
tween the modest and reluctant appearance at court of a 
member of the sacerdotal profession, in the edifying and 
appropriate character of mediator or intercessor for the good 
of others, and the circumstance of a priest being seen there, 
in vain and unbecoming attendance, as a participator in the 
folly of ostentatious ceremony, or the indulgence of incon- 
sistent luxury. 

If, however, it be no more than a natural result of his po- 
sition as a state-prelate, that a Protestant Archbishop of Dub- 
lin should go to the Castle, as the representative of the religion 
of the government, it is equally fair that a C atholic Archbishop 
of Dublin should do the same, as the representative of the 
religion of the^ people. And thus it is, that the union 

L.of C. 



100 THE GREEN BOOK. 

of one church or body of clergy with the state and its va- 
nities, tends to infect the ministers of other churches with 
similar unclerical frivolities ; to say nothing of the worldly 
spirit of rivalship for state-honours or favours that must 
more or less exist between the different bodies of Christian 
teachers, so long as a state-church exists, or until priests of 
every religious community shall be cut off from the least 
hope of the formation of any tie between any one church 
and the state, by the clergy of all denominations being 
left to depend solely on voluntary contributions. The cause 
of active religion, and the consequent increase of piety, has, 
however, been still more deeply injured — as it is only 
natural that it should have been so injured — by the sub- 
stitution of a compulsory for a voluntary system of sacer- 
dotal maintenance. For, on the plain principle, that if men 
may calculate upon receiving the same salary or emolu- 
ments whether they do their business well or ill, they will, 
for the most part, give themselves as little trouble about it 
as possible, it follows, that the great body of the clergy of an 
established church, from the mere circumstance of their not 
being dependent upon their flocks for their incomes, will not 
attend to those flocks as assiduously as if an income were 
to be expected from no other source. Of the justice of this 
reasoning, the general notoriety of the greatly-dispropor- 
tioned decline in Ireland, during the last century, of the 
number of Church-of-England Protestants, as contrasted 
with the comparative increase of Catholics and Dissenters, 
is a sufficient evidence.^ According to the Parliamentary 

'"It is worth while to contrast things as they are at present, with 
what they were above a century ago. 

1731. 

Protestants, 700,451 

Catholics, 1,309,768 



2,010,219 



1835. 

Protestants, 1,516,228 

Catholics, ... . 6,427,712 



7,943,940 

Thus, it appears, that in 104 years Photestants of all kinds have only 
doubled, while the Catholics have increased to a vivB-fold degree.'* 
{Morning Register of 25th June, 1835.) In fact, it would seem from 
a general reference to history, that Providence has marked its disappro- 



THE GREEN BOOK. 101 

Return printed in 1835, there were then in Ireland for every- 
one Churchman no less than nine Catholics and Dissenters, 
and a surplus of 275,364 persons. In England, likewise, 
where, above a century ago, the Dissenters were so infe- 
rior to the Churchmen, the superior activity of a clergy de- 
pending upon voluntary, as opposed to legal or forced con- 
tributions, has been amply evinced by the official disclosure, 
made so far back as 1811, that, even at that period — a 
period, since which we know that Dissent and the conse- 
quent weakness and unpopularity of the Church have so 
widely increased — even then, out of the parishes of Eng- 
land containing above 1000 inhabitants, the established 
places of worship were but 2,547, while those of the Dis- 
senters amounted to 3,457 1 Indeed, the comparative merits 
of the voluntary and state-church systems may be decided 
upon by this one simple circumstance — that, in no possible 
instance, can the voluntary system ever be productive of 

bation of injustice and tyranny, in every country as well as Ireland, by 
the constant decrease observable in the number of an oppressing, and 
the far more than proportionate increase in the numbers of an oppressed 
people. This was what the royal Malthus of Egypt observed when, having 
found, that " the children of Israel were fruitful, and increased abundantly, 
and multiplied and waxed exceeding mighty, and the land was filled with 
them, he said unto his people, — ' Behold, the people of the children of 
Israel are more and mightier than we. Come on, let us deal wisely 
with them, lest they multiply, and it come to pass, that when there 
falleth out any war, they join also vnto our exemies, and fight 
AGAINST us — and so get them up out of the land !" (Exod. chap. i. v. 1, 
2, 3.) Then followed his majesty's inculcation of his straight-forward 
and consistent " preventive check*' in the shape of infant murder, which 
our modern Malthusians have not the honesty to avow, but which, we 
are told, was defeated, because those Irish Papists of antiquity, the He- 
brew women, were so " lively /" Mr. Urquhart, too, has noticed, in his 
work on Turkey, that notwithstanding the many oppressions and 
slaughters perpetrated upon the Greeks by their eastern despots, and 
more especially the Cromwellian system of wholesale devastation and 
massacre practised in the Morea, on the defeat of the Greek insurgents 
and their Russian allies, during the latter half of the last century, the 
numbers of the Greeks rapidly increased, while the amount of those 
oriental Orangemen, the Turks, still more rapidly declined. Long, then, 
in spite of tyranny and Malthus, may the oppressed people of every 
country successfully act upon the maxim of " The Wife of Bath :" — 

" ♦ Increase and multiply' is heaven's command, 
And thaVs a text I clearly understand." 

Generation in an individual, will ultimately work out regeneration 
in a political^ sense. 

9 



102 THE GREEN BOOK. 

injustice, inasmuch as it rests on the universally applicable 
and undeniably fair principle of requiring no man to pay 
for what he does not think he has gotten value. On the 
contrary, in no instance but one, and that now, and perhaps 
always, a very unlikely one, namely, the instance of every 
person in a country believing the same doctrines, and con- 
sequently so far capable of getting value for the money 
levied to maintain them — in no instance, but this solitary or 
improbable one,^ can an Established Church exist without 
doing injustice, by forcing money from some individual or 
individuals, to whom, as disbelieving in it, it can give no 
return for the sums it levies. Religiously speaking, too, 
the voluntary system will alone be found to stand the test 
of a strictly conscientious examination. For if, in order to 
avoid the manifest injustice and plunder of allowing the 
clergy of one church to tax all other churches, we pay the 
preachers of every sect by salaries from the public trea- 
sury, as is done in France, then must the members of dif- 
ferent religions, in such a nation, be acting so far in oppo- 
sition to the dictates of religious truth and consistency, as 
to contribute money to support several religions which they 
consider to be false, as well as the one religion which they 
will believe to be true ; and the injustice will besides 

^ Thus, even in Ireland, during a period of such miserable political 
anarchy, and consequent intellectual darkness, that a superficial judge 
of human nature would not expect to meet the example of a martyr to 
scepticism, we find an instance of disbelief, not only in the Catholic, 
but even in the Christian religion ; and, it need scarcely be added, that 
there will always be more who doubt in an established faith, atid sup- 
press their opinions from fear, than of those who will dare to suffer mar- 
tyrdom in the cause of infideUty. " A.D. 1327. Adam Duffe O'Toole 
was convicted of blasphemy in Dublin, viz., for denying the Incarnation 
of Christ, the Trinity in Unity, for affirming that the Blessed Virgin 
was a harlot, that there was no Resurrection, that the Scriptures were a 
mere fable, and that the Apostolical See was an imposture and usurpa 
tion, and, the next year, pursuant to his sentence, was burned in Hog- 
gin Green (now College Green) near Dublin." (Whitelaw^s and 
Walsh's History of Dublin, vol. i. p. 170.) Yet, what is our present 
custom of virtually fining a disbeliever in a state religion for its support, 
but a modification of this ancient intolerance, by making individuals pay 
in pocket for that disbelief or dissent for which they would have been 
formerly condemned to pay with life ? For the scepticism, however, of 
the above-mentioned unbeliever, or of any other, it is not, of course, 
meant to offer any defence or palliation. Nothing, perhaps, has more 
fatally retarded the advance of political liberty than the sceptical works 
published by some of the leading advocates of popular freedom. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 103 

remain, of taxing, for the maintenance of priests, such per- 
sons as Quakers and Deists, who, as not believing in the 
necessity of, and therefore not being capable of receiving 
services from, priests, are ipso facto robbed by being made 
to pay for them. In fact, were the clergy of all sects to be 
salaried by the state, on the assumption of its being most 
consistent with justice to treat all sects in this manner, the 
hardship inflicted upon Quakers and Deists, or such as do 
not believe in the necessity for priests, would be still worse 
than where there is but one state-connected or Established 
Church, since, in the latter case, the Quaker or Deist will 
be only taxed for the clergy of one sect, while, in the for- 
mer, he would be obliged to pay for the priesthood of seve- 
ral persuasions. 

Thus, then, the voluntary church-system should be uni- 
versal amongst Christians ; Istly, as having been instituted 
by Christ and his Apostles : 2dly, as being proved by expe- 
rience to be the best calculated to preserve the purity of 
religion by keeping it apart from the corruptions and vani- 
ties of the state ; 3dly, as being the system most adapted 
to render that moral conduct, zeal, and activity, requisite for 
the preservation and diflfusion of religion, universal amongst 
its professed teachers, by making the diligent and constant 
practice of those virtues the only source for a subsistence 
to such teachers ; and 4thly, and above all, the voluntary 
system should be everywhere adopted, it being the only 
one universally applicable, as being incontrovertibly based 
on justice and reason, or the plain principle of not making 
any one pay, against his conscience and the " rights of pro- 
perty," for the maintenance of persons, from whom, as 
disbelieving in their ministry, he can receive no benefit, in 
return for the money levied upon him for their support. 
Indeed, so glaringly unjust is any other than the voluntary 
system, that the opposite principle of maintaining religion 
would appear to be considered intolerable, even amongst 
the despotic governments and Heathen nations of Asia. In 
the immense empire of China, there not only is no esta- 
blished religion, but we even read of the dethronement of 
some emperors, whose too great partiality towards the 
Bonzes, or priests of Fo, might, if allowed to continue, 
have procured those priests and their followers an unjust 
ascendancy over other sects, to the consequent violation of 
religious liberty and equality. In Tonquin, too, we have 



104 THE GREEN BOOK. 

been recently informed, that a native who was converted to 
Catholicity, being expelled from employment in a silk manu- 
factory, because he would not contribute against his con- 
science to a Pagan festival, brought his case before the Man- 
darins, who gave judgment against the opponents of the 
Christian, saying, " Since the Christians ask you for no 
money for the exercise of their religion, you have 720 right 
to force it from them for the exercise of yours !" And, 
in another district of the same country, a Christian having 
refused to subscribe to a dramatic representation in honour 
of the Tonquinese idols, and being in consequence beaten 
by the collectors, on the matter being referred to the local 
magistrates, the collectors were arrested and bastinadoed, 
each receiving fifteen strokes on their feet, " for endeavour- 
ing," says the account, " to force the Christians to co?2- 
tribute to a religious ceremony contrary to their con- 
sciences T'^^ If these Tonquinese Christians were Irish or 
English Papists or Dissenters, the collectors above men- 
tioned tithe-collectors or " rebellion ruffians," and the man- 
darins some of our Law-Church magistrates and judges, 
how very different would be those decisions ! Yet, con- 
trary to the slightest degree of equity, or to any respect for 
even that semblance of political decency, which has dic- 
tated, that, wherever an Established Church exists, its creed 
should be that of the majority of the nation, the'Church of 
England has been, in the most galling and obnoxious form 
of pecuniary exaction, the Established Church of Ireland, 
though by the First Report of the Commissioners of Pub- 
lic Instruction, instituted for the purpose of obtaining the 
comparative numbers of the different Christian sects in Ire- 
land, according to the census of 1831, the members of the 
Establishment were, out of a population of 7,943,940 souls, 
only 852,064 persons, as opposed to 7,091,876 Roman 
Catholics, Presbyterians, and other Dissenters ! What a 
spectacle ! — 852,064 individuals, privileged to tax for their 
religion a population of 7,091,876 persons, and even, in 
case of a non-payment or resistance to such a system of 
taxation, in the name of Christianity, privileged to pillage, 
incarcerate or shoot them ! Surely, there never was in any 
nation, a Church, whose doctrines, however pure, could be 
expected to prevail, when connected with, and weighed 

^ Instructive Magazine, p. 168-9. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 105 

down by, such a monstrous combination of abstract and 
practical injustice ! The gross income of the Irish Estab- 
lishment has been thus estimated from official data, in an 
able article in " The Monthly Chronicle" for May, 1838. 

£ s. d. 
Annual Revenue of continuing and suppressed Bishop- 
ricks, 151,127 12 4 

Income from Glebe Lands, 92,000 

Income from Ministers' Money, 10,000 

Income from Ecclesiastical Tithe Composition, 531,781 14 7 

Income from Corporations Aggregate, Deans and Chap- 
ters, &c., r 21 ,724 5 5 

£806,633 12 4 

This sum, divided amongst the 852,064 Irish Episcopalian 
Protestants, makes the religious instruction of each to 
amount to nearly 19 shillings a head per annum ! — whereas, 
in Scotland, where the Church Revenue for 1,600,000 Pres- 
byterians is but i^269,000 a year, the religion of each mem- 
ber of the National Establishment costs but .3s. 4d. ; and. 
in Belgium, the annual sum of ;£ 130,000 supplies a Catho- 
lic population of 4,000,000 with religion, at the rate of 8 
pence each !^ 

To get rid of such a gross insult to justice, Christianity, 
and Protestantism in general, and to Ireland in particular, 
the original Comet Club — a political and literary society, 
embracing members of various creeds — had the merit of 

> How easily might the Church be reformed, even according to Whig 
or comparatively moderate views, by the following plan. Give every 
clergyman a life provision proportionate to his present legal income, and 
reduce the property of the Church to the rented or unobnoxious revenue 
of £264,851, 17s. 9d. by either doing away with, or applying to na- 
tional purposes, the 541,781/. 14s. 7d. to which tithes and ministers' 
money amount. The 264,851/. 17s. 9d. a year, thus left for the spirit- 
ual instruction of 852,064 Irish Law-Church Protestants, would be only 
between five and six thousand pounds less than the annual £269,000, 
sufficient for nearly twice as many or 1,600,000 Scotch Presbyterians — 
and these, too, the great majority of the Scotch, and not, like the Irish 
Church Protestants, a mere trifling minority of the Irish nation. With 
her present churches, glebes, &c., with the help of some voluntary con- 
tributions from the lay members of the Establishment, who are the 
richest portion of the community, as they own nearly all the land in 
Ireland, and with the abolition of overpaid dignitaries, this sum of 
£264,851, 17s. 9d. would furnish a very fair provision for the clergy of 
the Irish Church, who would thus be neither so poor nor so rich as to 
be absolutely dependent upon, or too independent of, their flocks. 

9^ 



106 THE GREEN BOOK. 

combining, in Dublin, about the commencement of 1831. 
From the head-quarters of the Club in D'OUer-street, the 
commencing blaze of the vigorous fire against the Church, 
and in favour of the "voluntary system," which has since 
so widely spread through England and Scotland, was in 
consequence kindled by the irregular and fantastic but keen 
and scorching light of ''The Parson's Horn-Book." The 
first edition of this satirical work, with etchings by Lover, 
and amounting to between 1,000 and 1,500 copies, was sold 
off in less than a fortnight ; and the general impressions of 
ridicule and disgust towards the Church, so successfully 
begun, were briskly kept up by other publications of the 
Club, but particularly by the establishment of the Comet, 
a weekly Sunday newspaper. The recent success of the 
Irish people in their long struggle for Emancipation — the 
animating effect on the popular mind of the triumphant 
Revolutions of Paris and Brussels, and the then victorious 
resistance of the noble Poles to their Muscovite tyrants — 
the patriotic excitement extended from Dublin over Ireland 
by the metropolitan meetings for Repeal of the Union, com- 
bined with the general agitation for Parliamentary Reform 
in both islands, — the irritating violation of both political and 
personal consistency in Lord Anglesey's shameless execu- 
tion of a despotic act against Irish popular meetings, though 
he had affirmed that he would never enforce such an act, 
as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland — the judicial promotion of 
the Solicitor-General, Dogherty,^ who had no claim to such 
advancement but that of his having been the miserable par- 
liamentary tool, the senatorial cur-dog employed by the 

' The following keen and well-merited lines, in reference to this un- 
principled and insulting promotion, appeared in one of the publications 
of the Club, antecedent to the appearance of the Comet. 

EPIGRAM, 

ox CHIEF JUSTICE DOGHERTY. 



" Populus me sibilat." — Horace. 

In debate, for a Samson may Dogherty pass, 
For the weapon of both was the jaw of an ass. 
But, how happy it is, to have interest and friends, 
Since the likeness between them no farther extends ! 
The Jew lost his power with the hair of his head — 
But the Gextile gained his by a wig in its stead. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 107 

Tories to annoy Mr. O'Connell, as the representative of the 
Irish people, during the interval between Emancipation and 
the accession of the Whigs to office — all these causes, and 
others that might be mentioned, contributed to render the 
period of the establishment of the Comet Club the best that 
could have been chosen by them for founding an original 
and vigorously-written weekly periodical, on their princi- 
ples. Those principles cannot be better expressed than by 
the following animated lines that appeared in the first num- 
ber of the Comet, from the pen of one of the contributors 
to the early publications of the Club, and a subsequent 
member of the political and literary society of the Irish 
Brigade. 



THE COMET'S AVATAR. 



'* Among the sublime fictions of the Hindoo mythology, it is one 
article of belief, that the Deity, Brama, has descended nine times upon 
the world in various forms, and that he is yet to appear a tenth time, in 
the figure of a warrior upon a white horse, to cut off all incorrigible 
offenders. Avatar is the word used to express his descent." — Caxpbell. 



Our Comet shines to chase foul mists away, 
And drive dark Falsehood from her cell to-day — 
To scath the hands that break man's chartered laws, 
Or pounce on nations with a vulture's claws — 
To raise the prostrate, soothe the anguished breast, 
To check th' oppressor, bid the goaded rest — 
To give to man true knowledge of his kind. 
And lift him to that rank which Heaven designed — 
For ends like these, from high our Comet moves, 
Bright Freedom wings it, and fair Truth approves. 
Let Erin's sons salute its glorious ray — 
It shines to guide them to meridian day ; 
Bright as of erst when their free hands unfurl'd 
Their glittering sux-burst to th' admiring world — 
Resplendent as when Grattan's patriot hand 
Re-op'd its folds to bless the new-born land ! 

When Israel's sons from Egypt's bondage passed, 
Their God, by day, his mantling cloud o'ercast, 
And through th' uncertain darkness of the night, 
His fiery pillar poured a flood of light, 
To glad his people with its heavenly ray, 
And guide their feet on Freedom's glorious way ! 



108 THE GREEN BOOK. 

With Truth's own radiance, streaming from on high, 

Our brilliant Comet decks the western sky : 

It bends its keen, insufferable blaze, 

On mitred cant, and pensioned vampires' ways ; — 

And while swoln prelates yell their sacred moan, 

With holy twaddle, and with nasal groan, 

(Like some cracked pibroch floating down the gale, 

Or tithe-pig grunting in the lowly vale,) 

They may, like Satan, curse the Comet's Hght, 

Too clear, too dazzling for their blear-eyed sight ; 

And while, round them, all luminous it streams. 

Exclaim, "O Comet ! how we hate thy beams !" 

Yes — 'twill be our's to check the bigot's frown, 
Or despot's stride, that tramples Freedom down : 
Not all the arts to prop a sinking cause, 
Not all the bullets fired by reverend paws, 
(Though bay 'net-armed should rush each rav'ning priest, 
Who hugs the '■^loaves and fishes'^ to his breast,) 
Shall stop OUR course; we, from our sphere sublime, 
Will smile derision on those sons of crime. 
Avenge the victims of their perfidy. 
And blast the titled props of tyranny ! 
Yes — Themis' bench shall see no hand impure 
Deal partial laws to crush the suffering poor — 
And bloated prelates shall with bigots fly. 
While pure Religion waves her torch on high ; 
And sacred Truth, with Gospel-flag unfurled. 
Diffuse unpaid-for doctrines through the world ! 

Our Comet comes, and to each listening ear 
Declares the words to Freedom, Virtue, dear ; 
Soon will its rays dissolve that cursed spell 
Which o'er our isle long cast the clouds of Hell. 
Far from the soil their crimes have made a waste, 
Shall oligarchs those heartless wretches haste ; 
And soon shall Erin — as, regained her right. 
She stands a xatio?^, glorying in her might — 
(Proud England's sister — not, as now, her slave — * 
And :NruRSE of glory — not, as now, her grave — ) 
Cry, as she bends to earth her grateful knee, 
"'TwAs thou, bright Comet ! showed me Liberty !" 

Alpieri. 
May 1st, 1831. 

Such were the legitimate principles on which the Comet 
commenced ; and the sanguine expectations that were enter- 

* " We live too near the British nation to be less than equal to it." — 
Grattan, 



THE GREEN BOOK. 109 

tained of its future success, from the popularity of those 
principles, the talent contained in the Club, the establish- 
ment of the publication at such a peculiarly favourable time, 
were amply realized. In the short period from May to 
October, — a portion of the year, the worst, in a capital, like 
Dublin, for the sale of a new paper, owing to the absence, 
for the summer, of so many, to whom the existence of a 
recently-commenced metropolitan journal is consequently 
unknown — the Comet, independent of the local personality 
and disreputable scandal, which, after the retirement of the 
majority of its original contributors, finally polluted and 
destroyed it, arrived at the unprecedentedly large sale of 
2,300 copies a week. Although the Comet advocated both 
Reform and Repeal with unremitting vigour and ability, 
and, in opposition to the other weekly papers, was com- 
posed of original matter, instead of a mere collection of re- 
printed articles and of news from the daily organs of public 
intelligence, the sudden and extensive popularity of the 
"new luminary" was, above all other causes, attributable 
to its being the first organ of voluntaryism in the Irish press, 
and, in every shape, " from grave to gay, from lively to 
severe," the unflinching, incessant, and merciless adversary 
of the Church and tithe system. Before the appearance of 
the Comet, no Irish paper, however liberal, had advanced 
beyond a mere timid allusion or shillishalli comment upon 
what were called the ^'abuses of the Church Establish- 
ment." But the Comet not only boldly satirized and ex- 
posed what were called the ''abuses of the Church Estab- 
lishment," but branded the Establishment itself, from the 
fact of its being so, as an abuse to be exterminated root and 
branch; constanUy holding up every member of it from the 
Archbishops to the Curates as plunderers, inasmuch as they 
drew their incomes by force from a population, to which, 
as being Catholics or Dissenters, no value could be given 
in return — as plunderers, some indeed sharing more, and 
some less, of the public spoil, and some of them being more 
and some of them being less rapacious in their exactions, 
but still as a class of persons, all alike objects for public 
ridicule, and opposition to what they claimed, as undoubted, 
though law-supported, plunderers. 

This opposition, the Irish people were instructed to give, 
in that happy form of Quakerism or " passive resistance," 
which soon became equally general and effective. The 



110 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Parson demanded his tithes. The people were directed to 
give him the same answer that Leonidas gave to Xerxes, 
when, on asking for the arms of Leonidas and his compa- 
nions, he was told to '' Come, and take them !" — that is, 
if he could! The Parson accordingly came, with a due 
attendance of police, yeomanry, soldiers, auctioneers, &c. 
to get his tithes as well as he could, by seizing and auction- 
ing the crops or cattle of the refractory. These, however, 
through the aid of a well-arranged system of signals from 
natural or artificially-constructed heights, were very often 
effectually removed, secreted, or driven away : or, if ac- 
tually set up to auction, there were either no bidders for 
fear of the generally certain vengeance of the assembled 
people ; or else the catde sold at such a low price as only 
to occasion an additional loss to the Parson by not defray- 
m^ the expenses of the sale ; or lastly, if the animals, not 
bid for or not sold, were brought off to be disposed of else- 
where, they were branded with the inscription of " tithe" 
or '* seized for tithe," tracked by men appointed for the 
purpose, refused shelter, with their drivers, as having been 
so seized, and had finally either to be restored to their 
original owners, or disposed of in a lean and consequently 
depreciated condition, for what would not cover the mere 
cost of their journey ! The success of this system of anti- 
tithe tactics, thus generally recommended by the Comet 
Club, was unprecedentedly rapid, though not more so than 
they anticipated, both from the intolerable nature of the 
abuse attacked, and the mode of literary hostility selected 
for its destruction. This mode was the same as that adopt- 
ed by the philosophers in France, before the Revolution, 
for overturning the Church Establishment in that country, 
namely, the employment, not merely of reason and discus- 
sion, but of satire and ridicule, in every shape that could 
be likely to suit the light taste of a people exquisitely sus- 
ceptible to such impressions — a susceptibility, which, as it 
furnished such an excellent ground to work upon in France, 
would, it was judged, be equally capable of being triumph- 
antly worked upon in Ireland, from the admitted resem- 
blance of the Irish to the French character. With this re- 
semblance in view, the more serious arguments brought 
forward in defence of the Church were regularly answered 
by artillery of a similarly ponderous caliber and a more 
effective execution. But, while sufficient care was taken 



THE GREEN BOOK. Ill 

to reply to every discharge of heavy bail ia proper style, 
the main reliance of the Club was placed in the less massy 
indeed, yet more extensive, unceasing and biting fire of 
invective and contempt — a fire, which was accordingly kept 
up in every form, from the larger and more sweeping grape 
and canister of a dashing article, sketch, or dialogue,' in 
prose, to the smaller but keenly-peppering snipe-shot of a 
volley of epigrams in verse. Exclusive of various original 
contributions in the poetical line from members of the Club, 
difierent passages from the classics,^ and extracts from our 
leading poets, as well as numbers of the most familiar songs, 
(a few of which effusions are given in this volume,) were 
parodied with great efi'ect against the ecclesiastical incubus. 
In prose, in addition to several sharp anti-clerical parables 
and other compositions in imitation of Scripture, the gnarled 
and smashing: humour of the author of the first volume 
of the ''Parson's Horn-Book," with his amusing and ec- 
centric productions called •' Buckthorns," at once broke the 
bones of the " Bishops, Parsons, and small fry of the Esta- 
blishment," and evinced such comic and original powers 
of execution in the performance of his task, that his vic- 
tims w^ere only laughed at in proportion to the merciless 
vigour of his belabouring vivacity. In short, the Quarterly 
Review, the ablest and best periodical of the Tory and 
High-Church party, w^as soon abundantly justified in say- 
ing that the Comet Club " exhibit ed public proofs that its 
labours icere ^ot frivolous or unproductive^^ 

' For a specimen of this last-mentioned mode of composition, in imi- 
tation of Voltaire, vide Appendix, No. II. 

2 See, also, in Appendix, No. III., the excellent parody from Virgil, 
entitled " Paddy and the Bishop." It first appeared, in October, 1831, 
in the second part of '' The Parson's Horn-Book," by the original 
Comet Club, but is now given, in a more correct form, by permission of 
the author, from the papers of that body and the Irish Brigade. 

3 "There were in Ireland, of late years," says the Quarterly Review 
for June, 1836, " two societies, not simultaneous, but successive — one 
denominated the Coxet Club, the other the Irish Brigade ; both 
instituted, it was said, for the accomplishment of the same great work, 
* NATIONAL iNDEPENDExcE ;' both suspcctcd of having been concerned 
in some occupations which shunned the light, and each known to have 
eji\i\\yitedi public proofs that its labours were not frivolous or unpro- 
ductive. When we say ' the other,' we are not to be understood as in- 
timating that the second apparition w'as substantially different from its 
predecessor. The Comet had shaken ' from its horrid hair' a too por- 
tentous and too significant monition ; vulgar minds interpreted it into 



112 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Prepared as the public mind had been for a fiercer and 
more constant application of light and heat by the combus- 
tible matter which had been first piled around the Church 
by ''The Parson's Horn-Book," the tails of Samson's 
foxes did not spread a quicker and more destructive flame 
through the crops of the Philistines than that which the 
Parsons were involved in by the tail of the Comet. The 
anti-church insurrection extended itself " far and wide," 
and so effectually, that the then Secretary for Ireland, the 
present Lord Stanley, stated in the House of Commons, 
that an attempt by the government, with the aid of the 
army, to levy tithes, could, from an arrear of ^660, 000, col- 
lect only ^12,000 worth, at an expense of ^27,000 ! And 
if, in spite of every precautionary admonition to the people, 
a series of bloody affrays, from that of Newtownbarry in 
June, 1831,^ to that of Rathcormac in December, 1834, 

an advice to the Irish peasantry to massacre tlie Protestant clergy, — 
the enterprising and judicious discovered that the advice was given rather 
prematurely, — and a court of law was illiberal enough to pronounce it 
* a seditious libel/ The rebuked * Comet' withdrew, and the Comet 
Club dissolved. But, if we may borrow the expression from well-known 
optical illusions, it dissolved itself into a new society ; and, with an 
altered name, and its periodic time extended, ^ alter et idem'' the eclipsed 
luminary came forth from' temporary occultation, to lighten, as the Irish 
or the ' Catholic Magazine,^ we believe, the same projects and purposes 
over which, when bearing a bolder name, it had shed a disserviceable, 
because too pull and threatenixg an illumination." 

' The subjoined particulars of this revolting tithe-carnage, entitled by 
the Evening Mail " a little salutary blood-letting," have been supplied 
to the author by a friend, from information derived through the rela- 
tives of some of the sufferers. The cattle of a Mr. Patrick Doyle, a 
farmer, were seized in June, 1831, for tithe, claimed by the Rev. Mr. 
M'Clintock, a connexion of the pious Lord Roden and his episcopal 
brother of Philanthropic notoriety. Though the sum claimed did not 
amount to more than about £2, 6s. which, moreover, was denied to be 
LEGALLY duc till Novembcr, the cattle were advertised to be auctioned, 
in the Parson's name, on Saturday, the 18th of June. This was the 
market-day, and there was accordingly a large crowd assembled to at- 
tend the sale. Lord Farnham's Orange yeomanry, and the police, who 
were kept in readiness in the yard of his Lordship's agent, Captain 

G , were turned out to guard the cattle, on their being taken from 

the pound. Some of the people began to jeer the yeomen upon the use 
to which they were applying their new clothing and arms, and a few 
stones having been likewise thrown by some children from amongst the 
gathering multitude, the yeomanry fired, until 14 persons were shot 
dead upon the spot, and several wounded ! Some saved their lives by 
swimming through the river Slaney. A ball grazed the head of Mr. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 113 

occurred between the peasantry and the Orange yeomanry 
and police, reluctantly aided by the military, the established 
clergy, on the other hand, could not be always protected by 
such unapostolic satellites. Several members of that re- 
verend body fell victims to the vengeance of the peasantry, 
as an atonement for the blood of their slaughtered relatives. 
To such a pitch did this exercise of rural revenge take 
place, that the lives of clergymen of the Church of Eng- 
land, in Ireland, became uninsurable from the precarious 
tenure they possessed of an obnoxious existence, in the 
midst of a hostile and exasperated population. The legis- 
lature had to advance a loan of a million to the distressed 
priesthood of the Establishment, in lieu of the tithes, which 
it w^as found so impossible to enforce, that government dis- 
avowed the intention of attempting to collect them, even 
when armed with the aid of martial law, in the shape of the 
despotic Coercion Bill. The carnage-pile of Law-Church 
exaction at length became too atrocious and disgusting, 
after the massacre of Rathcormac, to be allowed to attain 
any greater elevation. The elusive fiction of a crafty attor- 
ney might, through the medium of his ^'rebellion writs," 
make a few straggling victims to the expiring cause of 
ecclesiastical decimation ; but such imperfect successes 
could not compensate for the complete investment of the 
falling institution, which this hero of the latitat would vainly 
seek to defend. When soldiers cannot maintain a system, 
attorneys will hardly be able to uphold it ; and the unjusti- 
iiable appropriation* of tithe must eventually follow its fel- 
low-impost of Church Rates to one common grave. And 
to the literary exertions of the original Comet Club, as 
having been the first that really "broke the black phalanx 
and let in the light," will the people of Ireland be prima' 

Patrick Doyle's eldest son, John Doyle, sweeping away one of his eyes 
and depriving him of the sight of the other. He is still hving— a me- 
lancholy monument of the Moloch effects of the "union of Church and 
State !" — Another young man, whose name was Miley Doyle, was also 
killed on that day. He was a fine handsome fellow, six feet high, made 
in proportion, universally liked in the neighbourhood, and only in his 
22d year. But the most horrible incident, in the details of this tragedy, 
was the case of a woman, named Mulrooney, through whose body, in- 
cluding that of an unborn child^ which she was then carrying, a musket 
ball tore its way, leaving the lifeless and bleeding remains of both ex- 
posed to the public eye ! Yet, for the blood shed on this occasion, no 
redress was obtained — no punishment inflicted ! 

10 



114 THE GREEN BOOK. 

rily indebted for such a desirable result. Like Blucher's 
Prussians, the rest of the Uberal press are, indeed, most 
ably and most efficiently pursuing and hunting down the 
disordered enemy^ — but, to the Wellington and Bulow of 
the Horn-Book and Comety must the honour of the original 
engagement be fairly assigned. 

The following are as many of the real particulars as it 
may be at present expedient to reveal with regard to the 
allusion of the Quarterly Review to the two societies of the 
Comet Club and the Irish Brigade. The Comet, and some 
other publications, not defaced by the private personality 
and the scandal, unconnected with politics, which after- 
wards injured and destroyed that journal, and embracing no 
other objects than the overthrow of the temporalities of the 
Church, the advocacy of Reform and Repeal, and an atten- 
tention, so far as those important questions might permit, 
to literature in general, were edited and written, with the 
exception of some comparatively few contributions, by the 
body entitled in these pages the original Comet Club. In 
December, 1831, when the Comet had a wholesome circu- 
lation of something between 2,500 and 3,000 numbers a 
week, and might therefore be considered as established, the 
majority of the original and constant contributors to that 
paper from its commencement in May,^ ceased to write for 
it any longer, and, by so doing, consequendy could not he 
in any way answerable for those satirical accounts of 
private parties and other personalities unconnected with 
politics, which commenced about the month of February, 
1832. jibout the month of May or June following, the 
famous " Buckthorn" appeared, which was prosecuted by 
the Attorney General, Blackburne. But, though the prose- 
cution ended in the fining and imprisonment of the proprie- 
tors, yet such was the popularity of the Comet, on account 
of its services against the Church, that in spite of its other 
more recently adopted irregularities, a liberal subscription 
was raised in liquidation of the fine ; and, in a word, that 
paper could only be said to have fallen, as it eventually did, 
through the effects of its departure from those fair and legi- 
timate grounds of restricting its severity to obnoxious poli- 
tical institutions and characters, on which grounds it was, 
as has been seen, successfully established. On the seces- 

1 Including the author of this volurae. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 115 

sion of the majority of the original Comet Ckib from the 
Comet, in December, 1831, they, in connexion with some 
other gentlemen, all, with but one meritorious exception, 
independent of any thing they might make by literature, 
formed themselves into another political and literary society, 
called the ''Irish Brigade," and setup a new periodical, 
entitled, not the Catholic, as the Quarterly Review has 
supposed, but the Irish Monthly Magazine. Neither 
the '' Irish Brigade," nor the society from which it origi- 
nally sprang, were exclusively Catholic. Their objects 
were exclusively nothing but whatever exclusiveness or 
sectarianism can be detected in the words, '' Let no man 

BE OBLIGED TO PAY FOR A PRIEST OR A RELIGION IN W^HICH 
HE DOES NOT BELIEVE ReFORM IN PARLIAMENT and RE- 
PEAL OF THE Union."' These measures continued to be 
generally advocated by the new society in their Magazine, 
as well as in other publications of similar views. In fine, 
the Irish Monthly Magazine was kept up for some years, 
until, from various motives connected with the increasing 
private avocations and engagements of the members of the 
body in which it originated, — some of w4iom were in par- 
liament, others at the bar, and others again excusable 
deserters of politics and literature for a tie of a more " in- 

i LINES, 

[by the late dominick ronatxe, Esa. M. p.] 

Suggested by the patriotic device of the Irish Monthly Magazine — an 
engraving of the present Bank, and former Farliament House of 
Irelandt^ivith the motto " fuit et erit" underneath ! 

Yes, it has been, and it again shall be, 

A nation's pride, — thy temple, Liberty ! 

A nation's senate-house — that dome which rung 

With freedom's accents from a Grattan's tongue, 

Proclaiming to his country and mankind 

That Irish laws alone could Ireland bind — 

Scorching, when in indignant wrath he rose, 

With moral lightning his loved country's foes, — 

The sacrilegious miscreants, who for gold 

The soul and body of a nation sold. 

That house, remembrancer of pride and shame, 

Shall vindicate its origin and name ; 

Shall see o'erturned the money-changers' board, 

Its throne, its COMMONS, and its lords restored; 

While joyous millions grateful blessings shed 

On him who roused his country that was dead ! 



116 THE GREEN BOOK. 

teresting and domestic nature" — the publication was dis- 
continued. At present, no intercourse, but one naturally 
resulting from the " auld lang syne" of a brotherhood in 
national feeling and the love of literature, subsists between 
the scattered members of the two societies noticed by the 
Quarterly. As to their past career, the best proofs of its 
merits are contained in the preceding history of the rise and 
progress of Irish anti-tithe agitation, and in the acknow- 
ledgement of such an able opponent as the Quarterly, that 
each of those societies '' exhibited public proofs that its 
labours were not frivolous or unproductive,^^ That this 
was the case, even independent of whatever literary ability 
their exertions might be deemed to possess, is, indeed, not 
to be wondered at. " When the sentiments of a people," 
says Napoleon, '' are against the government, every society 
has a tendency to do mischief to it." Any government, 
whatever it may be in name, can be only the representa- 
tive of misgovernment in reality, while connected with the 
defence of what I have shown to be such a monstrous and 
unparalleled anomaly as the Irish Church ; and the success 
of the Comet Club only proved how well its original mem- 
bers knew the feelings of their countrymen, in fearlessly 
acting upon the noble aspiration of Doctor Doyle, that 
" Our hatred of tithes may be as lasting as our love 
OF justice !" 



POSTSCRIPT 

TO 

"DAVID'S LAMENT." 



David's Lament and Wolfe's Lines on Sir John Moore — Critical defect 
of the latter as compared with the former poem, and the other chief 
remains of Hebrew song on iniportant national events — Obscurity of 
Wolfe's lines particularly demonstrated by their translation into 
French by Father Prout — Fittest place for those lines in a biography 
of Sir John Moore, or some future standard History of England, on 
the model of the modern French historians, Michaud, Barante, and 
Thierry — Historical use of national songs — Geddes's critical version 
of, and comments upon, David's elegy — Concluding remarks on the 
monotonous spirituality of Hebrew poetry. 

The beautiful lament of David, in the melancholy nature 
of the public occurrence which suggested it, in its excel- 
lence as a composition, and in the circumstance, that if the 
Hebrew bard left no other production behind him, it alone 
would suffice to immortalize him as a poet, may be com- 
pared to our countryman Wolfe's lines on the burial of Sir 
John Moore. Those lines, however, although as deservedly 
as universally admired, are far inferior to David's exquisite 
elegy. Contrasted with it, they display rather description 
than sentiment, rather images than feelings, rather selection 
than creation, rather painting than poetry. There is also, 
in Wolfe's lines, an inexcusable *' sin of omission" which 
is not in David's elegy, though in a production like the lat- 
ter, composed in an age and amongst a people ignorant of 
the principles of literary criticism, such a fault would be so 
much more pardonable than in a modern English poem. 
The fault is that noticed by Johnson, in his critical obser- 
vations on Pope's epitaphs — particularly of Sir Wm. Trum- 
bal and Mrs. Corbet — viz. the non-insertion in a poem of 
the name of the person upon whom it was intended to be 
written. '* To what purpose," says the Doctor, ''is an\r 

10* 117 



118 THE GREEN BOOK. 

thing told of him whose name is concealed ? The vir- 
tues and qualities so recounted.... are scattered at the mercy 
of fortune to be appropriated by guess." Then, after re- 
marking upon an epitaph with such an omission, that '' the 
name, it is true, may be read upon the stone," — meaning in 
a prose heading to the verse — the Doctor adds : — " But 
what obligations has it (the name) to the poet, whose verses 
may ivander over the earth, and leave their subject behind 
them, and who is forced, like an unskilful painter, to make 
his purpose known by adventitious help?'' A remarkable 
instance of the justice of this criticism occurs in Claudian's 
description of Stilicho's defeat of the Goths, under Alaric, 
in the great battle fought at PoUentia, March 29th, A. D. 
403. ^' In this engagement," says Gibbon, " which was 
long maintained with equal courage and success, the chief 
of the Alani, w^hose diminutive and savage form concealed 
a magnanimous soul, approved his suspected loyalty, by 
the zeal with which he fought, and fell, in the service of 
the republic ; and the fame of this gallant barbarian has 
been imperfectly preserved in the verses of Claudian, 
since the poet, who celebrates his virtue, has omitted the 
7nention of his name." This brave Alan chief, from the 
double fact of his having contributed so galiandy to a vic- 
tory that saved Rome and Italy, and his having acted thus, 
notwithstanding the suspicions of treachery entertained 
against him, must have been so well known, at the time of 
Claudian's contemporary eulogium, that every one could 
recognise to whom the poet's description referred ; where- 
as now, not even the adventitious aid of Claudian's com- 
mentators is able to ascertain the name which their author 
omitted to mention.' The praises of the poet, however 
splendid, are consequendy all so much homage thrown 
away, as being unappropriated by name to him alone for 
whom they were designed. Such a practice, indeed, of 
writing at rather than of a character, is justifiable in a sati- 
rical production, in which, from prudential considerations, 
it may be either necessary or expedient to point out the sub- 
ject of the composition, merely by the qualities or the acts 
attributed to him. Thus, the obscurity of Persius is justi- 
fiable, in his omitting to name, when he wrote against, the 
brutalities of a Nero. Thus, the law of libel, or statute 

1 De Bello Getico, v. 581-593. edit. Gesner. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 119 

for the punishment of offensive statements in proportion to 
their acknowledged truth, would justify a modern poet in 
limiting to a merely nameless notoriety the princely infa- 
mies of a Cumberland. A poet, in such a case, is like 
Ulysses in the Cy clop's den ; he only resorts to anonymous 
means as the best or safest method of destroying a monster. 
But, in a poem, written, or supposed to be written, for the 
purpose of commemorating national feelings of sorrow, 
admiration or triumph, whenever such statements and the 
peculiar representatives of them may b^ both clearly and 
safely expressed, we should certainly not be left indebted 
for an exact knowledge of who those personages, as well 
as their adversaries, were, to the lame and extraneous expe- 
dient of an epigraph or a note.^ Yet to this expedient we 

^ Where such political obstacles exist to the expression of sentiments 
of nationality, as might be apprehended under an ultra Tpry regime in 
Ireland, or a Muscovite despotism in Poland, an anonymous allusion, 
by the poet of a subjugated nation, to the objects of its interdicted ad- 
miration or regret, is excusable, as the result of necessity. Of this de- 
scription of poems is Moore's melody, " Oh, breathe not his name," on 
Emmet, and the following elegant lines, on the same subject, by a mem- 
ber of the original Comet Club, written before Emancipation, or while 
the Tories were in power, though not printed till 1831, in one of the 
early numbers of the Comet. 

THE UNIXSCRIBED TOMB. 



" I am going to my cold and silent grave ; my lamp of life is nearly 
extinguished ; my race is run ; the grave opens to receive me, and I 
sink into its bosom. I have but one request to ask at my departure from 
this world: it is — the charity of its silence. Let no man write 3iy epi- 
taph : for, as no man who knows xy motives dare now vindicate them, 
let not prejudice or ignorance asperse them. Let them and me repose 
in obscurity and peace ; and my tomb remain uninscribed, until other 
times and other men can do justice to my character. When my coun- 
try takes her place among the nations of the earth, then, and not till 
then, let my epitaph be written. I have done." — Robert Emmet. 



1. 

" Pray, tell me," I said, to an old man who strayed, 
Drooping over the graves which his own hands had made, 
" Pray, tell me the name of the tenant that sleeps 
'Neath yonder lone shade, where the sad willow weeps % 
Every stone is engraved with the name of the dead, 
But yon blank slab declares not whose spirit is fled !" 



120 THE GREEN BOOK. 

ARE left by the author of the lines on the burial of Sir John 
Moore. The specimens of national song upon great pub- 
lic events, which have been preserved in the Jewish histo- 
rical books, are, on the contrary, not only free from this 
defect, but, unlike the poem on Sir John Moore, in which 
the country of his interment is left as unknown as his name, 
those oriental songs localize, with more or less precision, 
the occurrences they celebrate, by introducing the appella- 

2. 
In silence he bowed, and then beckoned me nigh, 
Till we stood o'er the grave — then he said with a sigh, 
" Yes, they dare not to trace e'en a word on this stone, 
To the memory of him who sleeps coldly and lone : 
He told them, commanded, the lines o'er his grave 
Should never be traced by the hand of a slave ! 

3. 
He bade them to shade e'en his name in the gloom, 
Till the morning of freedom should shine on his tomb. 
* When the flag of my country at liberty flies, 
Then, let my name and my monument rise !' 
You see they obeyed him — 'tis twenty-eight years, 
And they still come to moisten his grave with their tears ! 

4. 
He was young, like yourself, and aspired to o erthrow 
The tyrants, who filled his loved island with woe : 
They crushed him — this earth was too base, too confined, 
Too gross for the range of his luminous mind." — 
The old man then paused and went slowly away, 
And I felt, as he left me, an impulse to pray : — 

5. 
" Grant, Heaven ! I may see, ere my own days are done, 
A monument rise o'er my country's lost son ! — 
And oh ! proudest task, be it mine to indite 
The long-delayed tribute a freeman must write ; 
Till then shall its theme in iny heart deeply dwell, 
So, peace to thy slumbers ! — dear shade, fare thee well !" 

O'MORE. 

The errors incidental to publication in a newspaper, and continued or 
augmented in the various reprints which have been made of this poem 
in England and America, as well as in Ireland, are corrected in this 
copy. The happiness with which the writer has thrown a dramatic 
locality round the dying words of the Irish patriot, without, at the same 
time, going farther beyond his last, and, as such, sacred injunction, than 
the natural and appropriate wish to be the author of the patriot's yet 
uncomposed epitaph, will strike every reader of taste. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 121 

tions of such places and people, as are either connected 
with the actions, or the results of the actions, commemo- 
rated. Thus, in the triumphal hymn of Moses on the pas- 
sage of the Red Sea, that sea is not only mentioned by 
name, in conjunction with Pharaoh, but the effects of his 
fate, and that of his army, upon " Edom," and the "mighty 
men of Moab,"*and the ''inhabitants of Canaan."^ 

Again, in the curious song, or fragment of a song, upon 
the conquest of Sihon, king of the Amorites, — who had 
made himself formidable to his neighbours, before the 
Israelitish invasion, by the defeat of the king of Moab, — 
the Hebrew bard mentions the name of Sihon's capital as 
well as that of Sihon himself, specifies the sites of that 
prince's exploits against the Moabites, — the '' people of 
Chemosh," or Chamosh, as they are poetically called from 
their national divinity, — particularizes the nature and geo- 
graphical limits of Sihon's devastations ;^ and does all this 
in a composition, containing not more than four verses or 

^ Exod. XV. 1-19. According to Doctor Geddes, the song of Moses 
is the earUest specimen of poetry in the Bible. See Geddes's Bible, vol. 
I, p. 127-8, and Critical Remarks, p. 235, for a critical translation of, 
and observations upon, that spirited ode. 

2 Numbers xxi. 27 — 30. The following version — the only consistent 
one — of this ancient song, is given by Geddes, who considers it as the 
exhortation of a Jewish bard to " his people to repair and strengthen 
(Heshbon) a city, whence, while in the possession of the Amorites, so 
successful a war had been carried on against Moab" — an exhortation, 
on the bard's part, vvrhich reminds us of the Roman tribunes' invita- 
tions to their countrymen, to settle, after its capture, in Veii, a city so 
famous for its long wars against Rome. 

" Come," exclaims the poet, "let Heshbon be rebuilded ; let the city 
of Sihon be repaired; for from Heshbon there went forth a fire :* from 
the city of Sihon a flame ; which consumed Ar of Moab, which devoured 
Bamoth-Arnon.-t" Woe to thee, O Moab ! Thou art undone, people 
of Chamosh I His sons he suffered to be fugitives, and his daughters 
to be led into captivity, by Sihon, a king of the Amorites !t Their fair 
fields Heshbon destroyed unto Dibon ; their fallow-fields unto Nopha by 
Medeba!"§ 

* The fire of war. | Ar, the metropohs of Moab, and Bamoth 
Arnon, included in the same kingdom, t A satirical reproach of the 
Moabitish deity, for allowing his worshippers to be so severely beaten 
by the comparatively inferior strength of the Amorites. § That is, the 
'•'fair" or cultivated, as well as the " fallow" or uncultivated, parts of 
Moab, equally experienced the ravages of the Amorites from Heshbon. 

Compare Geddes's Bible, vol. i. p. 271, and Crit. Remarks, p. 390 — 
392. 



122 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Stanzas. The song of Deborah gives, in like manner, a 
most copious detail of the personal and geographical cir- 
cumstances connected with its subject, the destruction of 
Sisera. Indeed, the author, so far from seeming to be 
shackled by verse in the enumeration of such circumstances, 
acquaints us with several historical particulars relative to 
the state and conduct of the Hebrew tribes at that period, 
which are neither to be found in the prose account of the 
battle of Mount Tabor, nor elsewhere in the Bible. ^ ' In 
fine, our more immediate subject, the elegy of David, spe- 
cifies so exactly the place and persons connected with the 
event it was written to commemorate, that, were the poem 
only a recent discovery in the form of a manuscript frag- 
ment, with neither a heading nor a note attached to it, the 
slightest acquaintance with Jewish history, in addition to 
the internal evidence of the production itself, would show, 
at once, that it was composed upon the deaths of Saul and 
Jonathan, at Gilboa, and upon no other occurrence. On 
the contrary, should the lines upon the burial of Sir John 
Moore happen to be discovered at a similar interval of be- 
tween two and three thousand years hence, without either 
an explanatory heading or note, no critic, however versed 
in as much of English history and literature, as we may 
suppose from analogy to be then extant, could, on reading 
those lines, decide, as to what particular personage or oc- 
currence they alluded. The name of the poet's hero. Sir 
John Moore, would be involved in more darkness than his 
own nocturnal interment. It could not be even ascertained 
but for the single line, "In the grave where a Briton has 
laid him," whether Britons, rather than the natives of any 
other country, had been connected with the nameless funeral 
described by the poet. In fact, can there be a better proof 
of the defect noticed in Wolfe's lines than the ease, the 
vraisemblance, with which they have been appropriated to 
a French subject by the playful Hardouinism of the brilliant 
Father Prout? In his introduction to an admirable French 
version of that poem, in which he affects to believe, that, 
as its supposed author never wrote any thing resembling it 

^ Contrast Judges iv. and v., and see the two versions of Deborah^s 
song, with the comments of Geddes (vol. ii. p. 9 — 13) and Milman, 
(Hist.of the Jews, voL 1, p, 192 — 195.) The latter has the merit of 
uniting the learning of a scholar with the taste of a professor, and 
more than aprofessorf of poetry. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 123 

in spirit, he could not be the real author of it — that, in con- 
sequence, the original of the poem must be sought for 
elsewhere — and, finally, that the French version is that 
original of which Wolfe was merely a translator — Prout 
gives his French as the original, which he pretends to have 
been written upon the interment of a Colonel de Beauma- 
noir, who, in 1749, levied a regiment in Brittany, his 
native country, with which he sailed against the English, 
on the unfortunate French expedition to India, under Lally 
Tolendal ; died in Pondicherry, the last Indian fortress of 
France ; and was buried at night on the north bastion of 
that fortress by a few followers, who, the next day, sailed 
with the remains of the French force to Europe. How 
much of this last anecdote is true or not is of no conse- 
quence, since it does not affect the argument drawn from 
the mere fact of such an introduction and version as Front's 
being quite sufficient to demonstrate the obscurity or inade- 
quate identification of Wolfe's lines with Sir John Moore 
and Englishmen only. By referring to the version in 
question,^ it will be seen that the mere solitary proper name 
of "A Briton," which Prout adapts into " un Breton," 
is insufficient to preclude the stanza containing it from being 
applied to a personage and a people quite opposite or hostile 
to those upon whom the production was really written : — 
a transfer of appropriation, which, from David's having so 
copiously identified and localized his elegy with the cha- 
racters and the people upon whom he composed it, there 
would be an utter impossibility of effecting with his poem, 
even supposing a translator to possess two national desig- 
nations as commodiously convertible into each other in 
other tongues, as " Briton" into '' Breton," in English and 
French. Thus, so completely dependent upon some ex- 
traneous explanation of its subject is Wolfe's otherwise fine 
poem, that its fittest place would be either in a life of Sir 
John Moore, or at the end of the future chapter that may 
be devoted to an account of his death, in what we have not 
yet, and, according to the present mode of historical com- 

^ See Bentley's Miscellany, vol. i. p. 96-7. Even exclusive of the fault 
on Wolfe's lines noticed in the text, I cannot regard them, with Prout, 
as " setting criticism completely at defiance." The following line, 
"That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his head.^'' 
is decidedly incorrect, as containing a rhyme within a rhyme in a verse 
of that description of metre. 



124 THE GREEN BOOK. 

position, cannot have, — a really standard history of Eng- 
land. I say this, in reference to the revolution, which, to 
a greater or less degree, must occur in English historical 
writing, before we can even know how to " set about" the 
realization of such a desideratum ; — a revolution, to be 
modelled after the modern French school of such historians, 
as Midland, Barante, and Thierry, who, by throwing the 
interest of individual exertions and sympathies into history — 
by rendering it picturesque — by industriously selecting and 
tastefully grouping those leading facts and circumstances in 
which the manners and feelings of each particular age " live, 
and move, and have a being," before us — who, by doing 
all this, have contributed to make history what it should, as 
far as possible, be made, — ^a characteristic or panoramic 
record of the important actions, opinions, and general con- 
dition of nations, as marked and modified by the great dis- 
tinguishing peculiarities of each particular period, instead 
of beinsf, as at present, little more than a generalized mass 
of frigidly narrated events, stripped of flesh and blood, and 
marbled into the comparatively hard, pallid, and eyeless 
image of w^hat is styled ''philosophical" history.^ 

^ Mr. H. L. Bulwer, in the chapter on "History," in his excellent 
work on " France," has most justly appreciated and fairly displayed the 
merits of the great modern school of French historians, who have come 
nearest to Mr. Macaulay's admirable " beau ideal" of historical compo- 
sition, described in the Edinburgh Review for May, 1828, by having 
duly availed themselves of those minute materials, first so happily ap- 
plied by Sir Walter Scott, in his novels, to the delineation of character 
and manners, though neglected by the laziness, false taste, ignorance, or 
conceit, of our philosophical historians. From this chapter of Mr. 
Bulwer's work, from M. Thierry's preface to his Norman Conquest, and 
from Mr. Macaulay's incomparable article on " History,'* above alluded 
to, — but, more especially, from the passage commencing with, " While 
our historians are practising," &lc. at page 361 of the Review, to the 
end — the best clue may be obtained to the true mode and spirit of writing 
history, in opposition to the arbitrary, unfeeling, unindividualizing, un- 
sentimental style, which is the general, and, indeed, the necessary cha- 
racteristic of our so-called philosophical historians. It is somewhere 
related of Mr. Pitt, that such was his political abstraction and consequent 
parelessness as to what he ate, that when he had a turbot for dinner, his 
servants always cut off and kept the fins or epicure's morsel for them- 
selves, till this habitual oversight of the great statesman was at length 
pointed out to him by a friend. And such has been the fate of history, 
the best though smaller portions of which have been strangely aban- 
doned to the inferior grade of novel and romance writers by the mere 
politically occupied attention of their literary superior, the historian. It 



THE GREEN BOOK. 125 

In a conversation on music, in St. Helena, Napoleon, in 
terms as applicable to the words as to the melody of a tune, 
observed — " A well-composed song strikes and softens the 
mind, and produces a greater effect than a moral work, 
which convinces our reason, but does not warm our feel- 
ings, nor effect the slightest alteration in our habits."^ Nor 
was this a mere abstract or theoretic statement of Napoleon, 
speaking as a private individual in St. Helena, but an 
opinion by which he was influenced as a politician, in the 
height of imperial power, as appears from the following 
anecdote related by Colonel Napier. — After alluding to the 
Emperor's arrival at Dresden before the Russian expedition 
— the renewal there of the " ancient story of the King of 
Kings in his person" — and the final junction of 200,000 
French with 200,000 confederate soldiers on the Niemen, 
the Colonel thus proceeds: — *' During the passage of the 
Niemen, 12,000 cuirassiers, whose burnished armour 
flashed in the sun, while their cries of salutation pealed in 
unison with the thunder of the horses' feet, were passing 
like a foaming torrent towards the river, when Napoleon 
turned and thus addressed Gouvion St. Cyr, whose repub- 
lican principles were well known, — ' No monarch ever had 
such an army !'^ — ' No, Sire.' — ' The French are a fine 
people ; they deserve more liberty, and they shall have it ; 
but, St. Cyr, no liberty of the press ! That artny, mighty 
as it is, could not resist the songs of Paris T "^ Indeed, 
on the principle involved in this assertion of Napoleon, 
France, under the ancien regime, had been characterized 
as '*an absolute monarchy tempered by songs." The 
powerful effects of the famous Marsellaise hymn, at the 
commencement of the revolution, are too well known to be 
expatiated upon ; and, in our own day, the noble songs of 
Beranger and their prosecution by the government of 
Charles X. have exercised no small influence upon the ex- 
pulsion of that wretched legitimate from the French throne. 

is full time, however, that such an error should be remedied. It is time 
that history should be served up with its fins. 

^ Antommarchi's Last Days of Napoleon, vol. ii. p. 25. 

2 Compare several of the circumstances of Napoleon, in this scene, 
with Gibbon's admirable account of the last expedition and death of the 
Turkish Sultan Alp Arslan — a passage, which is, perhaps, the most 
splendid piece of pictorial writing in the entire work of that yet unri- 
valled English historian. 

3 Hist, of the Peninsular Wir, vol. v. p. 67 & 8. 

11 



126 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Even in more plodding, mechanical, money-hunting Eng- 
land, Addison and Burnet inform us, what an important 
share the ballad of Lullihulero had in rousing the country 
to that resistance of James II. which ended in the Revolu- 
tion. " Never, perhaps, so slight a thing had so great an 
effect," says the bishop ; '' the whole army, and at last the 
people, both in city and country, were perpetually singing 
it,^''^ The great Lord Chatham has likewise asserted, 
that he would give the making of the laws for the making 
of the ballads of the people — a maxim, the spirit of which 
was acted upon by his son, Mr. Pitt, when he bestowed a 
pension upon Dibdin, for the great services he was so justly 
deemed to have rendered, during the French war, as a naval 
Tyrtaeus. And, with a due comprehension of the principle 
which has dictated these remarks, M. Thierry, an eloquent 
representative of the great modern school of French histo- 
rians, has most happily introduced, into his interesting 
narrative, occasional extracts or specimens of national 
poems or songs upon the events of their time, as tending to 
give the reader a more lively or contemporaneous concep- 
tion of the occurrences and feelings which led to the com- 
position of such productions, than could ever be conveyed 
to us by any of those falsely-styled /?/u7osop/«'c«/ historians, 
that, in the empty or fastidious presumption, in the superfi- 

' Burnet, in De Lolme, on the Constitution of England, chap. xvii. 
p. 252. Dove's edit. In thus expressing any surprise, that " so slight 
a thing" as a song could contribute to great poUtical events, Burnet dis- 
plays much less acquaintance with human nature and general history 
than his brother prelate Lowth, Bishop of London, who, says Moore, 
" was of opinion that one song like the Hymn of Harmodius, would 
have done more towards rousing the spirit of the Romans, than all the 
philippics of Cicero." {Advertisement to the Fourth Number of the 
Irish Melodies.) Though affected to be disputed by our great national 
bard, for a temporary object, or in reference to a report, that the Irish 
Tory Government of the day intended to prohibit any further publica- 
tion of the Irish Melodies as dangerous, the justice of Bishop Lowth's 
assertion connot be better evinced than by instancing the important 
public effects of Mr. Moore's own melodies, not merely on the fate of 
his own country, where their full results are yet to be accompHshed, but 
in Poland, where those delightful songs were translated, as applicable to 
the unmerited destiny of that noble nation, and thus contributed, as has 
been acknowledged by Mr. Moore himself, to the gallant though melan- 
choly results with which we all are, unfortunately, too well acquainted. 
Let us hope, however, that, in this instance, time and events will ulti- 
mately justify the prediction of the naUonaJ song, "Thou shalt not yet, 
dear Poland, perish !" 



m> 



THE GREEN BOOK. 127 

cial or stilted stolidity, of their dogmatic dignity, take no 
notice of such characteristic and influential effusions of 
popular opinion. Of the general effect of M. Thierry's 
allusions to, or citations from, these interesting memorials 
of national sentiment, an adequate idea can only be formed, 
by reading his excellent '' History of the Conquest of Eng- 
land by the Normans.''^ Of the particular effect of such 
citations, at greater length, it is suflicient to instance the 
author's introduction of the Saxon song on the great battle 
of the Brunanburh (or Brunanburgh) in 934, and the song 
of the Pagan skald upon the death of Erric, the Norwegian 
sea-king and ruler of Northumbria.^ In modern history, 
an author should, perhaps, confine himself to prose, in his 
endeavours to make his readers '*live o'er each scene and 
be what they behold ;" though, even in the more grave and 
prosaic periods of modern history, I doubt, if pages of the 
comparatively chaffy, one-sided stuff, called philosophical 
history, — in which we hear of men acting and feeling rather 
than see them doing so, — in which, to borrow a legal illus- 
tration, history is given to us in a sort of formal, humdrum 
deposition, instead of being dramatically produced upon the 
green cloth in open court — even in these more modern and 
less poetical times, I question, whether an historian, if re- 
lating, for instance, the sentiments of the United Irishmen, 
and the opponents of the Union, could ever identify his 
reader's mind so completely with the feelings of each, as 
by introducing into his work the vivid representation of 
those ideas that would be conveyed in '* Ye sons of Hiber- 
nia, assert your birth-right,^^ on one side, and, on the 
other, in the once famous Anti-Union song, commencing, 
''May He, in whose hand.^'^ 

1 Vol. II. p. 122-125. 
2 UNION FOREVER. 



Tune — Logie of Buchan, 

I. 
Ye sons of Hibernia, assert your birthright ; 
For Freedom, for Union, for Liberty fight. 
No longer in Erin let bigotry reign ; 
No longer let factions your union restrain. 
Oh, Erin forever! — oh, Erin's the land 
Where Freedom and Uniojc shall go hand in hand ! 



128 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Doctor Watts, in some of his works, praises Cowley's 
plan, in his Davideis, of diversifying the epic poem by an 
occasional introduction of lyrical compositions, as being an 
innovation, not only agreeable from the mere circumstance 

II. 

Oppressed by disunion; the North first unites, 

In union fraternal the West now delights ; 

In the East, like the sun, all its radiance you see; 

When the South is united, then Erin is free. 

Ohy Freedom forever / — uh, Freedom for me ! 

May ^VE cease to exist, when we cease to be free ! 

III. 
Oh, Union how social I oh. Union how rare ! 
In which all religions may EauALLT share! 
That unites in one cause both the rich and the poor — 
Makes the fate of our tyrants decided and sure! 
Oh, Union for ever ! — oh, Union's a rock 
The force of our tyrants no longer shall mock ! 

IV. 

Though Perjury doomed thee, dear Orr, to the grave, 
Thy blood to our Union more energy gave ; 
For Union's a current. — impede but its course, 
Far and wide it extends, and resistless its force ! 
Ye sons of Hibernia, then join hand and hand, 
To chase your oppressors from Erin's green land ! 

For these now rare though fine lines, (as given above,) I am indebted 
to the manuscript of a friend. The other song, dissuading Ireland from 
a Union, as different from its namesafce as a real kiss of peace from the 
kiss of Judas Iscariot, is as follows : — 

NO UNION 

For our dear native Island / 



I. 
May He, in whose hand 
Is the lot of each land, 

Who rules over ocean and dry land, — 
Inspire our King 
111 advisers to fling, 

Ere destruction they bring on our Island ! 
For, oh! she's our owx little Island, 
Our dear and our beaut f id Island — 

May her shamrock so green 

No longer be seen, 
Distained with the blood of ovb. Island? 



THE GREEN BOOK. 129 

of its variety, but as being natural in itself. And, if this 
novelty be approved of as natural in the epic, should it not 

II. T 

The fair ones we prize 
Declare they despise 

Those who'd make it a slavish and vile land ; 
Be their smiles our reward, 
And we'll gallantly guard 

All the RIGHTS and delights o/our Island — 
For oh ! 7i5 a lovely green Island ! 
Bright beauties adorn our Island ! 

At Saint Patrick's command 

Vipers quitted our land — 
But he's wanted again in our Island! 

III. 

For her glory or pride, 
We've fought by the side 

Of England, that haughty and high land; 
And we'd do so again, 
If she'd let us remain 

A free and a flourishing Island — 
But she, like a crafty and sly land, 
Dissensions creates in our Island, 

And our feuds to adjust, 

She'd trample to dust 
All the freedom and strength of ovr Island. 

IV. 

A few years ago, 
(Though now she says no,) 

An agreement was made with our Island, — 
That each as a friend 
Should the other defend. 

And the crown was the link of each Island! 
'Twas the final state-bond of each Island ; 
Indefendence she swore to each Island ; 

Are WE now so absurd 

As to credit her word. 
When she's broken her oath with our Island? 

V. 

Let us firmly stand 

By our own native land, 

And she shan't be enslaved by a vile land, — = 
Whose ambition for gain 
Would insatiably drain 

All the wealth and the blood of our Island. 
11* 



130 THE GREEN BOOK. 

be much more, or, at least, equally allowable, in history, in 
which the feelings of nations should not only be pictured 

Beware how you sport with our Island ; 

You're my neighbour, but, Bull, this is my land / 

Nature's favourite spot, 

And rd sooner be shot 
Than surrender the rights o/our Island / 

This spirited effusion, — of which I regret that I do not know any 
name for the air, and am thus unable to convey a sufficient idea of the 
merit of the words, to a general reader — is one of the several clever 
Anti-Union songs written by the witty and convivial Edward Lysaght, 
of the Irish Bar — when our Bar was properly such. Even Lord Castle- 
reagh paid a just compliment to the merit of those compositions, after 
hearing the author sing them at the Castle, by teUing him, as I have 
been informed, that if such songs were generally sung through the 
country, they would excite a greater opposition to the Union, than all 
the speeches against it in Parliament, since those speeches did not give 
the objections to the measure with half the point in prose that the songs 
expressed them in verse. "M«?/ He in whose hand'^ is now, however, 
so scarce, that I am only indebted for a copy of it to a contemporary of 
the author ; for, in the posthumous collection of Mr. Lysaght's poems, 
every unpalatable effusion, to the Tory destroyers of Irish independence, 
was suppressed, through circumstances connected with certain family 
considerations, unnecessary to mention. Thus, like the lines of Burns, 
on a similar topic, hereafter adverted to, the best productions of Mr. 
Lysaght were consigned, as far as possible, to the fate of the national 
independence in which they originated ! Well and truly has Homer 
said, 

Jove makes it certain, that whatever day 
Makes man a slave, takes half his worth away ! 

Such interesting memorials of poetical Anti-Unionism, and all similar 
remains of Irish national feeling in its most extended sense, should, 
however, he collected from old music-books into a regular work, like the 
Jacobite Minstrelsy of Scotland. If Ireland is ever to attempt a re- 
sumption of her former legislative independence, those lyrical effusions 
w^ould form no bad democratic Scriptures of poetical nationality, for cir- 
culation by a Bible Society of patriotism. 

Freedom's battle once begun, — 
Bequeathed by thinking sire to son, 
Though baffled oft, is ever wox ! — Byron. 

If, on the contrary, we are to remain West-Britons^ such a collection 
of the poetical relics of our past nationality would not be less attractive 
and creditable to us, in a literary point of view. 

Thus shall Memory often, in dreams sublime, 

Catch a glimpse of the days that are over ; 
Thus, sighing, look through the waves of time, 

And the long-faded glories they cover ! — Moore. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 131 

as well as their actions, but in which a collection of the 
mere dry bones of such actions, unenveloped in the vitality 
of contemporary feeling, is of little, if any more value, than 
an ''old almanac!" Judging, then, by " analogy, man's 
surest guide below," as it is styled by Young, Wolfe's lines 
on Sir John Moore, if inserted in a history of England, 
written after the equally natural and improved models 
alluded to, would be read in such a work, 1000 or 2000 
years hence, with an interest similar to that with which w^e 
at present read the poetical quotations in M. Thierry's his- 
tory, or peruse the song of Deborah and David's elegy, as 
luckily preserved for us by the compiler of the Jewish an- 
nals.' And, in such a history of England, or in a biogra- 
phy, as I have said, of Sir John Moore, would be the fittest 
place for the lines on his interment, in order to insure them 
that fixed and permanent application to him whom they 
were written to celebrate, which, from the total omission 
of his name, or of any peculiar locality connected with his 
fate, they do not of themselves afford. 

The following literal translation of, and comments upon, 
David's elegy, (which the author of this essay had, how- 
ever, not seen, till after the completion of his metrical ver- 
sion,) are from the pen of the erudite and critical Geddes : 

I. 

O antelope of Israel ! 

Pierced on thine own mountains ! 

Ah ! how have fallen the brave ! 

n. 

Tell it not m Gath : 

Publish it not in the streets of Ashkelon: 
Lest the daughters of the Philistines rejoice! 
Lest the daughters of the uncircumcised exult ! 



I. antelope . . pierced on thine own mountains. An apostrophe 

to Jonathan The antelope is, over all the East, regarded as the 

emblem of beauty and agility ; and has always afforded an ample field 
of metaphor to the Oriental bards. ... I believe it is common to all the 
deer-kind, when closely pursued, to run at last to their usual original 
haunt, and there to meet the fatal stroke. — Whose heart is not deeply 
touched by this allusion 1 



1 Mr. Alison, in his very able and erudite, though Tory, "History of 
Europe during the French Revolution," has, perhaps, been influenced 
by something like the views here advanced, in giving Wolfe's lines a 
place in a note, at the end of the narrative of Sir John Moore's burial 



132 THE GREEN BOOK. 

III. 
Ye mountains of Gilboa ! 
On you be neither dew nor rain ; 
Nor fields affording oblations : 
Since, there, hath been vilely cast away 
The shield of the brave ! 
The shield of Saul ! 
The armour of the anointed with oil ! 

From the blood of the bold. 

From the havock of the brave ; 

The bow of Jonathan was never held back, 

The sword of Saul never returned in vain. 

V. 

Saul, and Jonathan ! 

Linked, in their life-time, by mutual love, 

At their death they were not disunited. 

They were swifter than eagles : 

They were stronger than lions. 

VI. 

Ye daughters of Israel ! weep over Saul : 
Who clothed you in delightful scarlet ; 
Who put ornaments of gold on your apparel. 

VII. 

Ah ! how have fallen the brave. 
In the midst of the battle ! 

Jonathan ! pierced on thine own mountains. 

VIII. 

1 am in distress for thee, my brother Jonathan ! 
Very dear to me wast thou ; 



III. Nor fields affording oblations, i. e. Let thy fields, O Gilboa, 
henceforth produce nothing worthy to be offered to the liord. 

IV. The how, &c. — the sword, &c. The parallelism is here inverted : 
the last line of the stanza corresponding with the first, and the third 
with the second. 

V. They were swifter, &c. Swiftness, in those days, was considered 
as one chief quaUty in a warrior. So, among the Greeks, Achilles is 
particularly distinguished by the epithet swift-footed, 

VII. and VIII. Jonathan, Sic. Nothing, I think, can be more 
pathetic than this inimitable stanza ; which I could never read without 
rapture. Indeed, the whole composition is admirable, whether we con- 
sider it as a singularly fine piece of lyric poetry, or as a powerful engine 
to move to reconciliation even the most bitter adversaries of the royal 



THE GREEN BOOK. 133 

To me thy love was wonderful ; 
Surpassing the love of woman ! 

IX. 

Ah ! how have fallen the brave ! 
How perished the weapons of war !" 

I cannot conclude my observations upon this admirable 
poem, without venturing to add, what a pity it is that we 
have not more productions of the Jewish poets in general, 
and of David in particular, upon events of a mere worldly 
or human interest ; such, for example, as this elegy, and 
the justly admired effusion of Hebrew patriotism, com- 
mencing ''By the rivers of Babylon we sat down and 
wept, when we remembered thee, Sion.^^ I am not, I 
hope, so tasteless as to be insensible to the merits, or so 
irreligious as to be indifferent to the benefits, of some devo- 
tional poetry. But, with comparatively few exceptions, 
poems that would deeply interest the great mass of man- 
kind, in their present imperfect condition, must treat of 
human actions and appeal to human sympathies — must de- 
scribe the conduct of mere men towards each other, and the 
operation of that conduct on their minds and hearts, as 
influenced by worldly circumstances, instead of being 
limited to the necessarily vague attempts of such immea- 
surably inferior creatures as we are, to hold communion 
with HIM who ''maketh darkness his pavilion." "The 
topics of devotion," says Doctor Johnson, of religious 
poetry, '* are few, and being few are universally known ; 
but, few as they are, they can be made no m'ore ; they can 
receive no grace from novelty of sentiment, and very little 
from novelty of expression."^ With Johnson, — of whose 
opinion on this point, only a small portion is, for brevity 

author. Though Jonathan is evidently the chief object of his lamenta- 
tion, yet he interweaves so artful and fine a panegyric of Saul, his 
avowed enemy, as must have greatly tended to destroy prejudices; and 
was, doubtless, highly contributive to that purpose. His ordering it to 
be taught and sung by those of his own tribe, could not fail to have a 
strong effect on the other tribes ; and this, with the lenity of his govern- 
ment, and his known valour and piety, at length triumphed over the 
feeble remains of Saul's party. On the whole, I will venture to say, 
without any fond partiality for my author, that all antiquity affords not 
a more precious relic of genuine elegiac poetry than this ode. Geddes's 
Bible, vol. II. p. 101, 102. 
1 Life of Waller. 



134 THE GREEN BOOK. 

sake, given — Boileau concurs in his Art of Poetry."^ This 
deficiency in events and feelings of a mere human or 
worldly nature, which forms the present comparatively 
monotonous character of Hebrew poetry, might have been 

' De la foi d'un Chretien les mysteres terribles 
D'orncmens egayes ne sont point susceptibles. 
L'evangile a I'esprit n'ofTre de tous cotes 
Que penitence a faire, et tourmens merites, 
Et de vos fictions le melange coupable 
Meme a ces veritc^s donne 1' air de la fable. 

To the fine poetic effect, however, of religious associations, when ex- 
tended beyond the circle of mere abstract or metaphysical devotion, and 
properly connected with circumstances of an earthly or historic interest, 
I believe few, or none, can be insensible. As an eminent example of 
this effect, I cannot help subjoining, from memory, these extremely 
beautiful lines of the Honourable George Agar Ellis, afterwards Lord 
Dover. 

STANZAS. 



" In the city of Cracow, in one of the chapels of the cathedral, a mass 
is perpetually saying for souls of the kings of Poland. This has now 
continued for some centuries ; and a foundation exists to insure its con- 
tinuation for ever." 



1. 

A hallowed fane 

Adorns the plain 
Where Cracow's towers arise, 

Beneath whose dome, 

In his narrow tomb. 
Each crowned Jagellon lies. 

2. 

Within those walls 

The dim light falls 
On an aged churchman's head, 

Who recites alone, 

In hollow tone, 
The litanies of the dead. 



'Neath the burning ray 
Of the summer's day 

Which the longest sees the sun, 
By the cold moonlight 
Of the winter's night 

Still glides that requiem on. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 135 

lessened, had we the lost book of Jasher, the meaning of 
which Geddes supposes to be "the book of songs," adding, 
" it seems to have been a collection of historical ballads, in 
which the great achievements of the nation were narrated, 
with all the embellishments of Oriental poetry ; and some- 
times, it may be imagined, with poetical exaggerations."* 
The account we have of the results of Solomon's studies 
may alone suffice to show, that Hebrew learning was not 
exclusively theological. " He spake," says the Book of 
Kings, '* 3000 proverbs; and his songs were 1005. And 
he spake of trees, from the cedar that is in Lebanon even 
unto the hyssop that springeth out of the wall : he spake 

4. 

The ceaseless stave 

Sounds through the nave, 
As the weary chanter sings 

For the kings whose bones 

Lie beneath the stones — 
For the ancient Polish kings. 

5. 

Ages have fled 

Since among the dead 
Those monarchs' heads were laid ; 

Yet, of masses to save 

Their souls in the grave, 
The debt is still unpaid ! 

6. 

Sarmatia's sway 

Hath passed away, 
Her star is set in night ; 

Of her long-passed reigns 

No trace remains, 
Save this solitary rite. 

7. 

And still, though all 

In this world must fall, 
And nations be no more, 

Shall that solemn chime, 

To the end of time, 
Be for ever chanted o'er ! 

Those verses alone, like the elegy of David and Wolfe's lines, should 
be sufficient to perpetuate the poetical reputation of their noble author. 

• Bible, vol. i. p. 310. 



136 THE GREEN BOOK. 

also of beasts, and of fowl, and of creeping things, and of 
fishes."^ The loss of what app-ears to have been such a 
mass of literary as opposed to mere theological knowledge, 
and the annihilation of the other analogous productions, which 
must have preceded or followed those studies of the Jewish 
monarch, may be attributed, partly, to the destructive re- 
sults of the Babylonian conquest, and partly, to the natural 
policy or prejudices of the Hebrew priesthood, that would 
limit the attention of their order to the. peculiar care and 
preservation of so much of the national poetry and other 
literature, as was immediately connected with sacerdotal or 
religious objects. But, by whatever causes such a loss has 
been occasioned, it must be ever a subject of regret to the 
curious student of antiquity, in a philosophical, and, still 
more, in a poetical, point of view. 

' 1 Kings, iv. 32, 33. 



POSTSCRIPT 

TO "NABIS AND THE UNION/^ 



CHAPTER I. 



Historical sketch of, and resemblance between, Scotch and Irish Anti- 
Unionism. — Remarkable official testimony to the predominance of 
Anti-Union sentiments in Ireland. 

The strong and general feeling of Anti-Unionism in Ire- 
land, in which the lines in the text originated, and the public 
occurrences to which that feeling gave rise, assume a new 
aspect, and appear equally natural and excusable, as viewed in 
connexion with the events and ideas resulting from the opera- 
tion of the same spirit of posthumous nationality in Scotland. 
The aversion of the Scotch people was so general to their 
Union, which, in addition to its having been a notorious matter 
of sale by the aristocracy for about £50, 000, ^ imposed upon 

^ The " equivalent^'' to the Scotch Parliamentary Commissioners de- 
puted to treat of the terms of a Union, was £30,000. For this they 
sacrificed the rights of their country, particularly, in reducing her repre- 
sentatives from 155 to 45; though, on the score of revenue, Scotland 
should have gotten 60, and on that of population, 66 members. To re- 
dress an analogous injury done to Ireland at htr Union, is, I need scarcely 
add, one of the present objects of Mr. O'Connell. The additional sum 
of £20,000 given to the party of Scotch members called the Squadrone 
Volante, completed the sale of Scottish independence. Never, perhaps, 
were such instances of meanness and corruption displayed. " One nohle. 
Lord, (Lord Banff,) accepted," says Scott, " of so low a sum as eleven 
guineas; and ... he threw his religion into the bargain, and from 
Catholic turned Protestant to make his vote a good one /" It was 
in reference to such baseness, that the English Secretary Harley after- 
wards said, in reply to some Scotch Union members, — " Have we not 
bought the Scots, and did we not acquire a right to tax them ? or — for 
what other purpose did we give the equivalent .?" On the other hand, 
in the last Irish Parhament of 278 sitting members, the Union was only 
gained by 43 votes, chiefly consisting of rotten-borough members, 
many of whom were English and Scotch ofl[icers — while, in spite of 
bribes amounting in money to above £3,000,000, exclusive of £1,275,000 
compensation for boroughs, there was, without counting the Speaker's 
vote, that would in case of necessity have been given against the Union, 

12 137 



138 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Scotland an unprecedented weight of taxation, that in 1713, 
or but six years after the passing of the act, a motion for 
Repeal was made in the British House of Lords. Its pro- 
poser was the Earl of Finlater, who, at the time of the Union, 
was, as Earl of Seafield and Chancellor of Scotland, one of 
its principal promoters, and had even been so heartless as to 
exclaim, on witnessing the last dissolution of his native 
Parliament, " There is an end of an old song l"^ Thus, 
this Scotch, like our Irish, Lord Chancellor, Clare, lived to 
repent of the part he had taken in annihilating his country's 
independence ! The motion was only defeated by a hostile 
majority of four. The gentlemanly temperance and rational 
calmmess that distinguished this '' Repeal debate" form a 
very creditable contrast to the indecorous and violent threats 
of " civil war" from Lord Althorpe, and of ''resistance to 
the death" from Mr. Stanley, in reference to the proposed 
Repeal of the Irish Act of Union. With but one or two ex- 
ceptions, it would appear that the House of Lords would 
have agreed to a ''Repeal of the Union," if Scotland, to 
guarantee England against a "separation of the two coun- 
tries," by the apprehended choice of the Pretender in one, 
and of George I. in the other, would consent, as a condition 
of Repeal, that the English legislature alone should be en- 
titled to appoint the sovereign of the British empire !^ This 
was exactly Mr. O'Connell's plan of obviating the chance 

a glorious minority of 117! And nearly all these were men whose 
emoluments would have been great, in proportion to their having been, 
unlike their opponents, not the members for rotten boroughs, but the re- 
presentatives of real constituencies ! Thus the dishonest, as opposed to 
the honest portion of the Irish parliament, were, notwithstanding the 
most unparalleled temptation, only 43 in point of numerical superiority; 
or the very small difference, under such circumstances, of 160 to 117 ! 
— (See Mr. O^Conneirs excellent leiter to W. S. Lander, Esq.) Yet 
ivho talks of the corruption of the Scotch, and who does ?iot talk of 
the corruption of the Irish, Parliament 1 Such is the force of igno- 
rance and cant I 

' " Seafield the chancellor's observation, on adjourning the parliament, 
was, there is an end of aii auld sang, to his immortal memory and 
honour," (A short History of the revoluticn in Scotland, in a letter to 
a fiend at London, 1712.) Here is a truly English view of" immor- 
tal memory and honour !" The destruction of Scotch independence was 
gratif>ing to England; and, therefore, Scotchmen ought to consider 
Scotland's loss as Scotland's gain, because that loss was a gain to — Eng- 
land ! This mode of thinking, as applied to Ireland, at present, is too 
prevalent a specimen of " England and the English." 

2 Tindal's Rapin, vol. iii. p. 737-8, fol, edit. Lend. 1743. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 139 

of a separation between Ireland and England in case of Re- 
peal, so far as the objection that the two parliaments might 
appoint two different sovereigns, was in question ! The 
same year as the Earl of Findlater's motion occurred, a pe- 
tition for a ''Repeal of the Union" was signed by great 
numbers in Edinburgh ; after which the populace proceeded 
to the Parliament Close, and, under the statue of Charles 
II., drank Queen Anne's health, that of all true Scotchmen, 
and the "dissolution of the Union !"^ They then did the 
same, amidst great cheerings, at the Market Cross. These 
circumstances may be compared with the Repeal procession 
of the Trades of Dublin round the statue of King William, 
in front of the once Parliament House of Ireland in Col- 
lege-green, when that body went, attended by immense 
crowds, to present a Repeal Address to Mr. O'Connell, in 
Merrion-square, in the year of Lord Anglesey's rather per- 
sonally inconsistent proclamations. Addresses in favour of 
Repeal, were gotten up the^ next year, 1714, in Scotland; 
and '' it was also proposed," says Tindal, " that none should 
be elected 'members of parliament but such as icould pro- 
mise to use their endeavours for that purpose T^^ Thus, 
the idea of returning none but " pledged Repealers " is older 
than is generally supposed! Again, in 1715, Anti-Union- 
ism was active in Scotland ; for that year, observes Tindal, 
" was begun with endeavours for a remonstrance against 
the Union ; and the advice of the most famous lawyers was 
asked upon it, who declared the Act of the Union to have 
several nullities, and to be very defective ! 

A remarkable coincidence, it may be observed, with the 
opinions of our '' most famous law^yers," Bushe, Plunket, 
Saurin and others, with respect to the Irish Act of Union ! 
" The opposite party," continues Tindal, in reference to 
the Scotch Unionists, — ''the opposite party, to prevent a 
remonstrance so disagreeable to the Court, were forced to 
consent there should be no Address of Congratulation," — 
that is, no Address to George I. on his accession to the 
throne ; a circumstance which demonstrates the strength of 
the Scotch Repealers, as opposed to the weakness of the 
Leinster-Declarationists of that day ! The terms in which 
the Union -is mentioned the same year, in the Earl of Mar's 
manifesto, still further evidence the national dislike of that 

^ Tindal's Rapin, vol. iii. p. 745. 
2Id. ib. p. 801. 



140 THE GREEN BOOK. 

provincializing measure ; and the Chevalier Johnstone, who 
held a high post in the Pretender's army, says, in his Me- 
moirs, that, down to the year 1746, the Union was so ge- 
nerally abhorred in Scotland, even to the lowest peasant, 
that, had the Pretender identified himself with the Anti- 
Union feelings of the great mass of the population, by as- 
sembling a native Parliament in Scotland, and throwing 
himself upon the exclusive support of the Scotch, as their 
own king, instead of using them as mere provincial instru- 
ments to acquire the English throne, Scotland, with the as- 
sistance of France, would have had no bad chance of be- 
coming a separate kingdom, as formerly, under the Stuarts.^ 
Sir Walter Scott, in one of his antiquarian tracts, relates, 
on the authority of an eminent preacher of the day, that, 
at a later period, or considerably within the latter half of 
the last century, a sermon was not considered complete, 
unless it contained some observation or allusion to the Union; 
and, when Smollet wrote his continuation of Hume, the 
patriotic Earl of Belhaven's enumeration of the evils which 
he said would attend a Union, in his impassioned speech 

1 Mr. Home, in his History of the Insurrection of 1745, records, 
though with the sentiments of a modern, as contrasted with an ancient, 
of an English as opposed to an hnsli Scotchman, the following noble 
instance of enduring and determined Anti-Unionism in a Scotch gentle- 
man. After describing Prince Charles's capture of Edinburgh, and 
entrance into his ancestor's palace of Holyrood House, he adds: — 
*' When he (the Prince) was near the door, which stood open to receive 
him, a gentleman stepped out of the crowd, drew his sword, and raising 
his arm aloft, walked up stairs before Charles. The person who enlisted 

himself in this manner was James Hepburn of Keith ; he had 

been engaged, when a very young man, in the rebeUion of the year 
1715, and, from that time, (learned and intelligent as he was,) had con- 
tinued a Jacobite. But he had compounded the spirit of Jacobitism with 
another spirit: for Jie disclaimed the hereditary indefeasible right of 
kings, and condemned the government of James II. ; but he also con- 
demned the Union between England and Scotland as injuhious and 
HU3IILIATING to HIS country ; sayiug, (to use his own w^ords,) that the 
Union had made a Scotch gentleman of small fortune nobody, and that 
HE would DIE a THOUSAND TIMES vatJier than submit to it ! Wrapped 
up in these notions, he kept himself for thirty tears in constant 
readiness to take arms, and was the first person who joined Charles 
at Edinburgh : idolized by the Jacobites, and beloved by some of the 
best Whigs, who regretted that this accomphshed gentleman, the model 
of ANCIENT simplicity, manliness, and honour, should sacrifice him- 
self to a visionary idea of the independence of Scotland." (p. 100.) This 
wasj indeed, a glorious fellow — ultimus Scotorum/ 



% THE GREEN BOOK. 141 

against it, was *' looked upon as a prophecy by great part 
of the Scotch nation." From the cold and slurring manner 
in which such feelings of Scotch nationality are spoken of, 
when at all adverted to, by English authors — although such 
would be their own feelings had England been provincial- 
ized by France, as Scotland and Ireland have been by Eng- 
land, — it is not easy to trace to a more modern period the 
exact extent and continuance of an Anti-Union spirit in 
Scotland. How^ever, long subsequent to the time when the 
official information collected by Chalmers, in his Caledonia, 
shows, that Scotland was recovering the injurious effects of 
its Union, the lingering existence of aversion to that mea- 
sure may be observed in the occasional vivid representations 
of the old Anti- Union feeling, which are given in the novels 
of those great " painters from nature," Smollet, Moore, and 
Scott. At present, and long since, every trace of that feel- 
ing has perhaps expired among the higher orders in Scot- 
land. Yet as, in the language of Colonel Napier, " it is 
easier to oppress the people of all countries than to destroy 
their generous feelings;" and "when all patriotism is de- 
stroyed amongst the upper classes, it may still be found 
amongst the lower," we see a remarkable instance of pa- 
triotic regret that Scotland should be a province, in the 
letters of her noble peasant Burns, so late as the year 1790. 
In writing to his friend Mrs. Dunlop, the patriotic poet ex- 
claims : — "Alas! have I often said to mjself, ivJiat are all 
the BOASTED advantages which my country reaps from the 
Union, that can count erhalance the annihilation of her 
INDEPENDENCE, ami cvcn of her very name !^ I often re- 
peat the couplet of my favourite poet. Goldsmith, 

' In spite of the prevalent political notions respecting the " advantages" 
derived by Scotland froniv^er Union, Burns's idea as to their being of a 
more "boasted" than substantial kind, is by no means without some ap- 
pearance of foundation. The late Sir John Sinclair, after stating the 
Scotch revenue, in one of his letters, at ati^ut £4,500,000 a year, says, that 
from that sum, Scotland is annually obliged " to remit above 4,000,000 
to the English Exchequer — a greater tribute than luas ever paid 
by one nation to another. What, (asks Sir John,) would be the con- 
dition of this country, (Scotland,) if that great sum was laid out upon 
its ixTERXAL improvement ? . . . . What (he goes on,) would even 
England say, if it had a tribute of four millions per annum to 
remit to Fra>^ce] And, were it not for this tribute /o Exglaxd, 
(observes Sir John,) no distress could be experienced in Scotland.' 
But Scotland, (he concludes,) must pay four millions in gold to the 

12* 



142 THE GREEN BOOK 

States of NATIVE liberty possessed, 



Though very poor^ may yet be very blest,'' 

Nothing," continues Burns, " can reconcile me to the common 
terms, 'English ambassador, English court,' &;c. And I 
am out of all patience to see that equivocal character, Hast- 
ings" — meaning Warren Hastings, — ''impeached by the 
'Commons of England.'' ^^^ Such is the last perceptible 

English treasury — for no other species of money is receivable there." 
{Letter to Thomas Attwood, Esq., of Birmingham.) Sentimental or 
mere instinctive patriotism, is, after all, more sound and rational in itself 
than is generally imagined. See more on this subject in the Appen- 
dix from Taifs Magazine, at the end of this article. 

^ On another occasion, Burns is described, on beholding the ruined 
and roofless condition of the Hall of Stirling Castle, "in which the 
Scottish Parliaments had frequently bee?! held,^^ as having given vent 
to his indignant national feelings, in v^^hat are termed " some imprudent, 
but 7iot iinpoetical lines, which," it is added, " had given much offence," 
and were, as such, suppressed! Burns was, in fact, a fellow of the 
right sort — an Irish Scotchman ! "What a pity it is to think, that such 
a man should, in Byron's language, have ever been obliged to " quail 
from his inspiration, bound to please" — that he should ever have been 

-"trembling to be wrong. 



For fear some noble thoughts, like heavenly rebels, 
Should rise up in high treason to his brain I" — 

to think, in a word, that such a real specimen of God Almighty's, as 
contrasted with man^s nobility, should ever have been compelled to seek 
a gaugership from any descendant of the despicable aristocracy, who 
sold the independence of the land of Bruce and Wallace, for the 
WTetched bribe, for the Iscariot compensation, of £50,000 ! The sup- 
pressed Anti-Union lines of the high-minded peasant, that gave such 
" offence'^ to the degenerate descendants of the heroes of Bannockburn, 
may be supposed to have been something in the spirit of the following 
patriotic effusion, by my friend, the author of " The Uninscribed 
Tomb'' :— 

THE SHAMROCK, THE ROSE, AND THE THISTLE. 

I. 

The SHAMROCK, the rose, and the thistle combined, 
Have long been as emblems of union entwined ; 
But oh ! they regard not the emerald stem, 
Who tear it from earth — to entwine it with them. 

II. 

For the rose hath its thorns, and the thistle its sting, 
While naught can the shamrock but gentleness bring; 
And their touch, when they meet, darts the venom they bear 
To the life of the shamrock — that soon withers there. 



THE GREEN BOOK, 



143 



gleam of generous discontent at the extinction of Scotland 
as a nation — a feeling, so natural in itself, so truly noble in 
its source, so long in its continuance, and so recent in its 
expression, that if elegance of sentiment could communicate 
any of its softening influences to the rugged harshness of 
party politics, or if Lord Ormelie could care, as a mere 
Lord, to what country he belonged, one could hardly think 
that a countryman of Burns would have been the special 
mover of a Coercion Bill for the suppression of that feel- 
ing on the part of the Irish people. The best proof, how- 
ever, of the paramount popularity of Anti-Unionism in 
Ireland is given in the following list of the amount of sig- 
natures attached to the most numerously-signed petitions 
presented to Parliament up to the close of the Sessions of 
1834, when Anti-Union agitation became provisionally 
suspended : — 



Separation of Church and State, 

Alteration of Lay patronage in Scotland, 

Support of the Church of England, . 

Observance of the Lord's Day, 

Support of the Established Church of Ireland, 

Trades' Union Prosecutions, 

Relief of Protestant Dissenters, 

Abolition of Irish Tithes, 

Repeal of the Uniox 



Signatures. 
64,628 
104,343 
136,533 
155,512 
156,731 
221,517 
349,525 
367,034 
538,978 



in. 

The ROSE and the thistle together may cling, 
And impart to each other their thorn and their sting ; 
But say, shall the shamrock of Erix be found 
With their porcupine prickles eternally bound ] 

IV. 

Oh no ! in full freshness, unsullied 'twill blow, 
When round it nor roses nor thistles shall grow ! 
Too long have their presence retarded its growth. 
Then oh ! may our isle soon refuse bloom to both ! 

1831. O'MORE. 



H4 THE GREEN BOOK, 



CHAPTER II. 

Inquiry, as regards the idea of maintaining a Union by force, into the 
number of Irish who died in the British army and navy during the 
last half century, and likewise into the comparative military qualities 
of the British and Irish people. 

The petitioners against the Repeal were but 21,249 ! 

Thus, it appears that the Anti-Union spirit m Ireland was 
not only stronger than the national hatred of tithes, on ac- 
count of which so many sacrifices of property and life have 
been incurred, but even stronger than the degree of interest 
evinced in reference to the most exciting questions, in Eng- 
land and Scotland. Whether that spirit is destined to sub- 
side into permanent submission in Ireland, as it did in Scot- 
land, it is impossible to foretel. But if it does, such a sub- 
mission can only be effected by the success of the present 
experiment of a liberal and popular government to convince 
the Irish people that a maintenance of the Union will be 
better for Ireland than its dissolution.^ 

1 The able French historian of the Norman Conquest, — in comment- 
ing upon the letter of Donald O'Neill, king of Ulster, in the commence- 
ment of the 14th century, to Pope John XXII., at the time that the op- 
pressed Irish crowned Edward Bruce, as their king, and rose up against 
the tyranny of England, like the Poles, in our day, against the despo- 
tism of Russia, has instanced the native Irish as displaying a stronger 
and more enduring spirit of nationality than the people of any other 
country. I subjoin the concluding passage of O'Neill's letter — that 
Polish manifesto of its day — with a portion of the French historian's 
remarks on that interesting document, rather, as affording a lively des- 
cription of old national feelings, and, as curious, from the view taken of 
those feelings by an enlightened foreigner, than as presenting ideas capa- 
ble of influencing the conduct of the present generation. 

" We cherish," says this native Irish manifesto, " at the bottom of our 
hearts, ao inveterate hatred, produced by lengthened recollections of in- 
justice^ — by the murder of our fathers, brothers, and nearest kindred, — 
and which will not be extinguished in our time, nor in that of our child- 
ren ; so that, as long as we have life, we will fight against them, without 
regret or remorse, in defence of our rights. We will not cease to fight 
against and annoy them, until the day when they themselves, for want 
of power, shall have ceased to do us harm, and the Supreme Judge shall 
have taken just vengeance on their crimes ; which, we firmly hope, will 
sooner or later come io pass. Until then we will make war upon them 
unto death, to recover the independence which is our national right : 



THE GREEN BOOK. 145 

The Standard, speaking of the Repeal question, in terms 
which are a fair specimen of British Tory, and sometimes 
more than Tory, rodomontade on the subject, has said: — 
*' The Union must be maintained by force, and, thank 
Heaven, it can be maintained hy force ! And again, thank 
Heaven for the British heart, and the British arm, it shall 
BE MAINTAINED BY FORCE !" A little inquiry will, how- 
ever, show, or at least very nearly show, that any Union 
with Ireland, resting merely on ''force," or the power of 
the ''British heart and the British arm," would have 
rather a dubious foundation. In a strictly national and mili- 
tary sense, Ireland, as a united country, or as Leinster, 
Ulster, Connaught, and Munster, combining heart and hand 
in one cause, has never yet been conquered. The only 
period, when such a patriotic union of all sects and parties 
of Irishmen took place, was in the time of the Volunteers ; 
and THEN Ireland's claims were granted, because then they 
could not be safely refused! Ireland, then, with less than 
half her present population, and without availing herself of 
more than the comparatively aristocratic portion of her in- 
habitants, displayed a self-maintained force^ of above 100,000 

being compelled thereto by very necessity, and willing rather to brave 
danger like men, than to languish under insult." 

* This promise of war unto death, made upwards of 400 years ago, is,* 
says the historian, * not yet forgotten ; and it is a melancholy fact, but 
worthy of remark, that in our own days, [alluding to 1798,] blood has 
flowed in Ireland on account of the old quarrel of the conquest. The 
period in futurity, when this quarrel shall be terminated, it is impossible 
to foresee ; and aversion for England, its government, its manners, and 
its language, is still the native passion of the Irish race. From the day 
of the invasion, the will of that race of men has been constantly op- 
posed to the will of its masters ; it has detested what they have loved ; 
and loved what they have detested . . This unconquerable obstinacy, — 
this lengthened remembrance of departed liberty, — this faculty of pre- 
serving and nourishing, through ages of physical misery and suffering, 
the thought of that which is no more, — of never despairing of a con- 
stantly-vanquished cause, for which many generations have successively, 
and in vain perished in the field, and by the executioner, — is, perhaps, 
the most extraordinary and the greatest example that a people has ever 
given.' (Thierry, History of the Norman Conquest, vol. iii.jo. 168, 
172-4.) In this tenacious attachment to past national recollections, and 
ardent belief in ultimate political regeneration, even under the most de- 
pressing circumstances, the Irish may be classed with the ancient Mes- 
senians, the Jews, the modern Greeks, and the Poles. 

^ Grattan's Miscel. Works, p. 129, 130, and Barrington's Hist, of the 
Legislative Union, part. ii. p. 10, 11, and 12, edit. 1809. 



146 THE GREEN BOOK. 

effective men and 130 pieces of artillery. Indeed, since 
about that time, or the period of the American war, it is 
ridiculous to rant about what the " British heart and the 
British arm" could do asrainst or ivithoiU the aid of Irish- 
MEN. In April, 1783, Mr. Gardiner, afterwards Lord Mount- 
joy, remarked in the Irish Parliament, in reference to the 
Irish Catholics, that "• England had America detached from 
her by force of Irish emigrants."^ This statement, put 
forth on the information of British officers, and deduced 
from the circumstance, amongst others, of the numbers who 
spoke Irish in the American army, is confirmed by Doctor 
MacNeven, who says, that one of the many pretexts, in 
his time, for refusing Emancipation to the Irish Catholics, 
was the fact, that " 16,000 of them fought on the side of 
America."^ Nor were these all. *' The men," says the 
able editor of the Morning Chronicle, '*who, in the Ameri- 
can war, fought most bitterly against the English army, 
were the Presbyterians of Down and Antrim, who formed 
the Pennsylvanian line"^ — and these, as every one knows, 
were the very flower of the American force. 

Such were the opponents of the '« British heart and the 
British arm" abroad — while, of the British army that 
would have had to meet the Volunteers at home, in 
case of a refusal of the demands of Ireland, " nearly one- 
third," according to Barrington, '' was composed of Irish- 
men." This proportion of Irish representatives of i\\Q'' Brit- 
ish heart and the British arm" must have advanced rather 
than declined. Even before the first material relaxation of the 
Penal Code, we find it stated, without contradiction, by Mr. 
Grattan, in his speech to Parliament on the Catholic Bill, 
in February, 1792, that it was a matter " known by the gen- 
tlemen of the army that, since they had recruited for the 
foot in Ireland, the regiments had been filled in a great pro- 
portion with Irish Catholics."'^ According to General 
Cockburn, it was a subject of public boast in Ireland, that 
'' full half of the army that drove the French out of Egypt 

' Plowden's Hist. Rev. vol. iii. p. 45. 

2 MacNeven's Pieces of Irish Hist. p. 8. 

2 Morninsr Chronicle, 26th October, 1833. At home the Ulster por- 
tion of the Volunteer force alone, was 32,152 men, or but a few hun- 
dreds less than the whole of the British arm}'- at Waterloo ! One pro- 
vince of Ireland could do that then ! — what are the four to what they 
might be now ] Tanium religio potuit suadere malorum / 

"^ Grattan's Speeches, vol. iii. p. 6. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 147 

were Irish." ^ In 1807, or the year before the Peninsular 
War, Dr. MacNeven states the proportion of Irish in the 

^ Military Observations respecting Ireland, and its Attack and Defence, 
p. 12. — Dublin, 1804. This instructive pamphlet, printed without the 
writer's name, is attributed to Gen. Cockburn. 

From the county of Wexford, in particular, which Dr. MacNeven 
supposed to have supplied 40.000 men to the insurrection of 1798, great 
numbers, after its extinction, volunteered into the Brill-:) force, preparing 
against the French in Egypt. Numbers, also, who were sentenced to 
transportation, preferred joining that expedition ; and, with regard to the 
Irish recruits in general, it need scarcely be remarked, that the govern- 
ment oi that day would be anxious to have as many of them as possible 
in such a service, or anywhere, rather than in Ireland. The subsequent 
distinguished bravery in Egypt of those Wexford representatives of the 
'^British heart and the British arm," is briefly adverted to by Hay, in 
his History of the Wexford Insurrection. The insurgents, according to 
the continuator of Tone's life, were also considerably influenced to join 
the British expedition against Egypt, by a wish of revenge, on the 
French, the apparently faithless desertion of Ireland by the Republic — a 
desertion, however, which was principally, if not wholly owing to Bona- 
parte, who, when told, previous to his wild-goose-chase expedition to 
Egypt, that the Irish were prepared to rise and ought to be assisted, 
basely replied, that nothing more was to be desired from the Irish, than 
that their movements should operate as a powerful diversion in favour of 
France. Never was a narrow and selfish policy more signally and de- 
servedly punished. First, the fine fleet of France, consisting, besides 
frigates, &c., of 13 ships of the line, was destroyed by Nelson at the 
Nile. Secondly, a large portion of the picked veterans of France, pe- 
rished in Africa and Asia, uselessly, because for no ultimately available 
purpose. Thirdly, the French were beaten and expelled from Egypt by 
a British army, one-half of which consisted, as we have seen, of Irishmen, 
and the commander of which army, at the time of the French capitula- 
tion, was an Irishman. Fourthly, the French, and Napoleon's brother 
Joseph, whom he made king of Spain, were likewise driven from that 
country, and France itself invaded, through similar means, directed by 
the "retributive genius" of an Irishman. Fifthly, Napoleon himself was 
irretrievably defeated and dethroned, and France conquered by the same 
Irishman, who, had Napoleon, in 1798, landed his Egyptian army of 
40,000 men in Ireland, would, in all probability have been unknown, 
except as a refugee " Irish loyalist." Sixthly and lastly, this overthrow 
of Napoleon was, to a very considerable extent, effected by Irish taxes^ 
as well as by Irish troops, both of which England would have been de- 
prived of, had Napoleon done '-justice to Ireland." " A victory," says 
Bourrienne, " on the Adige (in Italy) would have been far better for 
France than one on the Nile." But, how much better still, for France, 
would have been a victory on the Shannon and the Liffey 1 This Na- 
poleon himself acknowledged, when too late, to Las Cases, at Saint He- 
lena. "^S/, au lieu de V expedition d'Egypte,^^ said he, '^feusse faite 
celle d^ImuASBEf que pourrait VAngleterre aujourdhui?^^ Napoleon 
but too well deserved the fate he met with. 



148 THE GREEN BOOK. 

British army as '' about one-half"^ — and that the estimate 
was not exaggerated, may be inferred from the following 
circumstances. On the motion of thanks to Sir Samuel 
Auchmuty, for the capture of Monte Video, the General, 
who proposed it, said, that the 7th regiment, which had so 
gallantly fought there, under Sir Edmund Butler, was com- 
posed altogether of Catholics — that is, Irish — and, that he 
himself knew, that of the 4,000 men who attacked that for- 
tress, 3,000 consisted of Catholics^ — or, in other words, 
Irishmen. In 1810, Sir John Cox Hippesley, (from whose 
speech, in the Catholic Question, in that year, the foregoing 
confirmatory particulars are cited,) mentioned in Parliament 
that, of his own knowledge, out of two levies of 1,000 men 
each, made a few years before, only 160 men were not 
Catholics ; that in another regiment of 900 in the south of 
England, 860 ivere Catholics ; and he added that it was then 
a well-established matter, that the proportion of Catholics 
(or Irish) exceeded that of Protestants (or British) in the 
English army ! It is a generally-affirmed fact, for which, 
as such, it is unnecessary to cite an authority, that at the 
Battle of Waterloo, at least two out of three parts of the 
'''British heart and the British arm" there, were Irish. 
From the demonstrations of sympathy evinced towards Mr. 
O'Connell, on his route to the Clare election by bodies of the 
soldiery, and from the results of an inquiry as to the dispo- 
sition and feelings of the army with respect to Emancipa- 
tion, before the passing of the Eelief Bill in 1829, it was 
" shrewdly suspected" by *' men in office," that the ''Bri- 
tish heart and the British arm" in that army would not 
be sufficient to arrest the settlement of that Irish question.^ 
And, in fine, at present, according to Sir Edward Litton 

1 Pieces of Irish History, p. 6. 

2 Speech of Sir J. C. Hippesley, on the Cathohc Question, May 18th, 
1810, p. 50. "In this glorious storm," says Mr. Alison, "the loss of 
the British was about 600, but twice that number of the enemy fell, 
and 2,000 were made prisoners, besides 1,000 who escaped in boats, so 
that the number of the garrison, at first, had been greater than that 
of the BESIEGING FORCE ! {Histori/, vol. \i. p. 150.) All very well, 
Mr. Alison, but why is all this " glorious storm" set down to the credit 
of oxE thousand British, and nothing at all said of the three thou- 
sand Irish companions 1 " Fair play is a jewel," as we say in Ireland ; 
and, please God, we must soon get it ! 

3 See, on this point, an able article on " O^Connell and the Catholic 
Association,^^ in Tait's Magazine for 1835, p. 307 and 309. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 149 

Bulwer, " two-thirds of the army are Irish !"^ '« The rea- 
son for this preponderance of Irish in the British service 
is contained in Mr. Tone's assertion, that '' the army of 
England is supported by the misery of Ireland ;" or, as the 
more loyal Duke of Richmond said, during the war, on 
being told, as Lord Lieutenant, of the distress of the Dub- 
lin tradesmen, — ''A high-priced loaf and low or scarce 
wages are the best recruiting Serjeants for his Majesty." In 
fact, '^les privations, la pauvrete, la misere,^^ as Napoleon 
observed, "font Vecole chi bon soldat,'^ or, to cite the more 
pointed remark adverted to by General Cockburn — not only 
fighting, but marching and starving, " are, at times, the 
soldier's lot, and the army that excels in these three points 
will probably (if decently commanded) ultimately succeed."^ 
The admitted superiority of the Irish, in these qualifications 
for a military life, as contrasted with the general mass of 
their insular neighbours, proceeds from the greater health, 
vigour, and hardiness of constitution produced by agricul- 
tural than by mechanical or manufacturing pursuits ; and, in 
England and Scotland, we know, that there are at least, two 
mechanics or manufacturers for one agriculturist, while, in 
Ireland, the proportion of the former to the latter is so small 
as to be, comparatively, not worth mentioning.^ The Irish 

^ Sir E. L. Bulwer's words are: "Two-thirds of the army, too, are 
Irish, and the lowest of them : — the dregs of an Irish populace ! What 
a reflection I" — {England and the English, vol. i.p. 87.) — Yes, indeed, 
" what a reflection /" 

2 Military Observations respecting Ireland, and its Attack and De- 
fence, p. 12. 

s On the 13th of May, 1830, Mr. Slaney, M. P., called the attention 
of the House of Commons to " the increase which had taken place in 
the number of those employed in the manufacturing and mechanical 
occupations, as compared with the agricultural class." From his calcula- 
tions it appears, that, in England, the manufacturers or mechanics, as 
compared with the agriculturists, were 6 to 5 in 1801 ; 8 to 5 in 1821 ; and 
in 1830, they were as 2 to 1. In Scotland the increase of the former over 
the latter class was still more rapid, the former was as 5 to 6 in 1801 ; as 9 
to 6 in 1821 ; and in 1830 as 2 to 1. While the general advance of the 
population of England and Scotland for twenty years, down to 1830, was 
30 per cent., the augmentation of their manufacturers had been 50 per cent., 
and in some cases, as at Leeds and Glasgow, as high as 54 per cent, in one 
town, and no less than 100 per cent, in the other. {See Combers Consti- 
tution of Man, p. 61.) How suitable to the formation of a military po- 
pulation the avocations of the great majority of those manufacturers are, 
will be best seen by a perusal of the debilitating or destructive effects of 
their pursuits upon their constitutions, and those of their offspring, as 

13 



150 THE GREEN BOOK. 

have, accordingly, been recently found and acknowledged, 
on English authority, to be better calculated for soldiers 
than the English and the Scotch. '' The company to which 
I belonged," says an English officer of the British Legion, 
in the Spanish service, *' when it first landed in San Sebas- 
tian, was above 100 strong on parade ; six weeks after its 
arrival at Vittoria, the utmost it could muster was fifteen files 
or thirty men. The regiment, in like manner, which origi- 
nally was between 7 and 800 strong, dwindled down, in the 
space of two months after the fever broke out, to not more 
than four hundred. All the other regiments, loitli the ex- 
ception of the Irish, Avere cut up in like manner, and two 
of them, the 2nd English and 5th Scotch, were so nearly 
annihilated that they were broken up, and the miserable re- 
sidue drafted into other regiments. The Irish Brigade^ 
on the contrary, suffered little or nothing from disease, 
although it was not better off for provisio?is or quarters 
than the rest of the force ; and the 7th, 9th, and lOth, to 
the very last, retained their superiority of numbers icith' 
out receiving a single recruit from the disbanded regi- 
ments. Had the ivhole of the Legion been composed of 
Irish, instead of losing 1000 men at Vittoria, we might 
not have lost 100. /;* spite of all their hardships, the se- 
verity of the winter, the total want of pay, the Irish lived, 
thrived, and grew fat, as if in clover.^^ Such are the ad- 
vantages of misery and starvation at home.^ 

detailed in the horrible picture of human suffering and human avarice 
presented in the parliamentary evidence on the factory system. In Ire- 
land, on the contrary, we are informed by the details of the census of 
1831, that the number of families chiefly employed in agriculture were 
884,339 ; while those occupied in trade, manufactures, and handicraft 
occupations, and, besides, ?iot subjected to the wholesale system of health- 
and-life-destroying Mammon-murder carried on in the British factories, 
were but 249,359. The males 20 years of age, or able to ca?Ty a mus- 
ket, were, according to the same official authority, 1,867,765 ; and, by 
including those who were 16 years of age in the estimate, of the mili- 
tary population of Ireland, her muster-roll would be still greater ! Under 
the auspices of her factory-augmenting, or peasant-lessening and me- 
chanic-increasing prosperity, England, indeed, appears to be fast pro- 
ceeding in a career of self-destroying cupidity, analogous to that of Car- 
thage, as observed by Cicero. "Nothing," says that great orator, states- 
man, and philosopher, "more weakened Carthage than the preference of 
its citizens, for trade and navigation, for which they neglected agriculture 
and arms!" Dt Repub. ii. 4, i?i Heerens African Researches, vol. i. p. 
40. 

J Twelve Months in the British Legion, by an officer of the 9th regi- 



THE GREEN BOOK 151 

So much for what could be effected on land, since the 
time of the American war, by the ''British heart and the 
British arm," without the aid of Irishmen. We shall now 
see what this same "British heart and British arm" was 
able to do on sea, without similar assistance. ''In the last 
war," says Mr. Grattan, in February, 1792, referring to 
the American contest, " of 80,000 seamen, 50,000 were 
Irish names ; in Chelsea, near one-third of the pensioners 
were Irish names ; in some of the men of war, nearly the 
WHOLE complement of men were Irish !"^ Thus, to cite 
one instance out of many that might be given in corrobora- 
tion of Mr. Grattan's assertion, ''In the year 1780," says 
Sir John Cox Hippesley, "when fewer Catholics entered 
the service than at present, (that is, in 1810,) the crew of 
the Thunderer, of 74 guns. Commodore Walsingham, was 
composed two-thirds of Catholics," or Irish. ^ Sir Jonah 
Barrington, then, is amply justifiable in his assertion as to 
what England had to dread on a naval, as well as a mili- 
tary, score, had the "British heart and the British arm" 

ment, p. 123 & 4 — a work, written, I believe, by Colonel Thompson, 
who, at all events, confirmed the truth of the above extract to Mr. O'Con- 
nell. In the so-called English Brigade in Don Pedro's service, the mi- 
litary merit of the Irish was also remarkably prominent, but, more espe- 
cially, in the attack of the Miguelite army on Lisbon, where the princi- 
pal position of the usurper was stormed by the Irish Division with the 
bayonet ! In adverting to some criticisms of the Freeman'' s Journal, 
upon the injustice of the London papers, that in speaking of the gal- 
lantry of Colonel Hodges and his companions at the seige of Oporto, set 
him and them down as English, though, as the Freeman remarked, the 
Colonel was a native of 'Limerick, and in his despatch " most of the 
names particularized by him for bravery were Irish,^' the following 
characteristic comment appeared in another Dublin Anti-Union journal. 
** The English live on our provisions," says the editor, " and they think 
they may swallow our military glory with equal gullibility. Their con- 
duct, in this respect, reminds us of the honest Highlander's remark in 
Zeluco, with regard to the consequences of the Union between England 
and his provincialized country : — ' Oh !' said he, ' whenever a Scotchman 
is hanged, the English cry out, see that blackguard Scotch rogue — he 
deserves his fate ! But, whenever a Scotch regiment defeats the enemy, 
there is nothing said of anything but the irresistible bravery of the 
English army !' Such are inevitable consequences of Unions. A na- 
tion that loses her independence is Uke a woman that loses her honour, 
either the one or the other is scarcely ever mentioned but to be insulted 
and despised ; all the imperfections of both are dwelt upon, and any of 
their perfections are scarcely allowed to exist." 

* Grattan's Speeches, vol. iii. p. 46. 

2 Speech, p. 51. 



152 THE GREEN BOOK. 

come to blows with the Volunteers in 1782. " The Bri- 
tish navy, too," says Sir Jonah, after referring to the amount 
of Irish in the English army, — " was then also manned by 
what Avere generally denominated British tars ; but a large 
proportion of whom were, in fact, sailors of Irish birth and 
Irish feelings, ready to shed their blood in the service of 
Great Britain, whilst she remained the friend of Ire- 
land, but as ready to seize, and steer the British navy 
into Irish ports, if she declared against their country! 
The mutiny at the Nore," he adds, in a note, "confirms 
this observation. Had the mutineers at that time chosen to 
carry the British ships into an iKisnport, no power could 
have prevented them; and, had there been a strong insur- 
rection in Ireland, it is more than probable they would have 
delivered more than one-half of the English ^ee^ into the 
hands of their countrymen!''''^ On the 1 7th of October, 
1796, Mr. G rattan, in his speech to Parliament on Catho- 
lic Emancipation, asserts, that without the Irish Catholics, 
the British navy could not keep the sea ; and that their 
proportion there was such, that their indisposition to Eng- 
land would be fatal. '' What," he exclaims, '' is the British 
navy ? a number of planks ? certainly not. A number of 
British men ? certainly not : no ; but a number of British 
and Irish. Transfer,''^ says he, "the Irish seamen to the 
French and w^here is the British navy?''^^ So convinced, 
indeed, were the French republican government of the 
great and indispensable numbers of Irish sailors in the Bri- 
tish fleets, that the first idea conceived, by the French mi- 
nister, Charles de la Croix, for accomplishing the invasion 
of and rendering Ireland an independent nation, was a 
scheme to diffuse disaffection and eventual mutiny and revolt 
through the Irish portion of the crews of his British Ma- 
jesty's navy, by scattering money amongst them.^ And 
this plan the French minister had conceived, as we learn 
from Mr. Tone, before any communication had taken place 
between them — a circumstance which strongly evidences 
the general conviction of the correctness of Mr. Grattan's 
statement. Some time previous to that statement, or in 
February, 1796, Mr. Tone says, '^ Let it never be forgotten, 
that two-thirds of the British seamen, as they are called, 

• Hist, of the Legislat. Union, ut supra. 

2 Speeches, vol. iii. p. 255. 

2 Tone's Works, vol. ii. p. 34, and 44. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 153 

are in fact Irishmen!"^ — and in the first curious Memo- 
rial upon the condition of Ireland, which he presented, the 
same month, to the minister of the Directory, he writes as 
follows, in proof of the above assertion: — ''For the navy, 
I have already said that Ireland has furnished no less than 
80,000 seamen, and that two-thirds of the English fleet 
are manned hy Irishmen. I will here," he continues, 
" state the grounds of my assertion. First, I have inyself 
heard several British officers, and, among them, some of 
very distinguished reputation, say so. Secondly, I know 
that when the Catholic delegates, whom I had the honour 
to attend, were at Saint James's, in January, 1793, in the 
course of the discussion with Henry Dundas, principal 
Secretary of State, they asserted the fact to he as I have 
mentioned, and Mr, Dundas admitted it, which he would 
most certainly not have done, if he could have denied it! 
And, lastly, on my voyage to America, our vessel was 
boarded by a British frigate, whose crew consisted of 
220 men, of whom no less than 210 were Irish, as I found 
by imiuiry ! I submit this fact,^^ concludes the Irish exile, 
"to the particular notice of the French government 1'^^ 
In the course of the following war, or in 1807, Doctor Mac- 
Neven states that the proportion of seamen, then furnished 
by Ireland to the British navy, as '* almost two-thirds"^ — 
and this estimate is not discountenanced by other authori- 
ties. Sir John Cox Hippesley, in the valuable parliament- 
ary speech already adverted to, said, in 1810, that out of a 
list in his hand of 46 ships of the line, which, at two dif- 
ferent periods, had belonged to the Plymouth division, the 
Catholics greatly exceeded the Protestants in the majority 
of the vessels. In some of the first and second rates, the 
Catholics amounted even to two-thirds ; while, in one or 
two first-rates, they formed nearly the w^hole ; and, in the 
Naval Hospital, about four years before, (or the period of 
the publication of Dr. MacNeven's book,) out of 476 
sailors, no less than 363 were Catholics."^ And, from the 
excellent character, as seamen, assigned to the Irish by 
Lord Collingwood — the companion-in-arms of Nelson, and 
second in command at the battle of Trafalgar, — from that 

^ Tone's Works, vol. ii. p. 199. 
2Id.ib. 192. 

3 Pieces of Irish History, p. 6. 

4 Speech, p. 51-2. 

13^ 



154 THE GREEN BOOK. 

character, and a remarkable proposal resulting from it, 
which his Lordship made to the Admiralty, it may be fairly 
assumed that the number -of Irish in the British navy rather 
augmented than diminished, during the remainder of the 
war against Napoleon. His Lordship, in writing to the 
Earl of Mulgrave, on the 23d of April, 1808, says, '-' One 
hundred Irish boys came out two years since, and are now^ 
the topmen of the fleet T^ — and the editor of his Lordship's 
correspondence gives the following account of the proposal 
to the Admiralty, thus alluded to, and the honourable 
grounds, with respect to the Irish, in which that proposal 
originated. '' He (Lord Collingwood) had found that Irish 
boys, from 12 to 16 years of age, when mingled with Eng- 
lish sailors, acquired rapidly the order, activity, and sea- 
manlike spirit of their comrades ; and that, in the climate 
of the Mediterranean, they often, in less than two years, 

became expert seamen He accordingly proposed to the 

Admiralty to raise yearly 5,000 Irish hoys, and to send 
a large proportion of them to his command," for the pur- 
pose, continues the editor, of having them *' taught and 
prepared in ships of the line, before they were sent into 
smaller vessels T^^ Here is an equally trust worth}' and 

' Edinburgh Review, for May, 182S, (p. 405—407, and 417.) 
With only a " Selection^ from Lord Collingwood's writings before him, 
while his Lordship's relative, editor, and biographer, had a still greater 
portion or the whole of those writings in his possession, and, as having 
them, could of course understand more of Lord C.'s opinions than any 
mere Edinburgh Reviewer — under such circumstances, I say, the self- 
opinionated scribbler on the Collingwood Correspondence in the Edin- 
burgh Review, strives to dispute the propriety of the high encomium 
and proposal respecting the Irish, coming from Lord Collingwood, and 
particularly dwelt upon by his editor, as a sort of explanatory justifica- 
tion of his Lordship's praise. Yet this very Reviewer, while endea- 
vouring, in the name of the English and Scotch, to dispute the just 
title of the Irish to such great praise as seamen, says, in arguing against 
the system of impressment, that it " can only be abolished with safety 
to the country by making the navy the nursery of seamen for the 
NAVY !" and that '^ good men-of-war saUurs can oxly be made ix men- 
of-war /" since " there onlyT he adds, " can they learn to manage guns 
and to act in concert, which are the ]most essential parts of. their busi- 
ness /" Well, and is it not to have thex taught, and for their great 
aptitude in acquiring those very tests of naval excellence, in the very 
way laid down by the Reviewer himself, that Lord Collingwood sought 
for and extolled the "Irish boysl" and, if so, what becomes of the 
Reviewer's attempt to argue for a natural inferiority of the Irish in sea- 
manship to the English and Scotch, in the teeth of such an authority 



THE GREEN BOOK. 155 

creditable opinion of Irish seamanship from one of the most 
honest men, both in his private and public capacity, as well 
as by far the ablest admiral, from the time of Lord Nelson's 
to his own death in the British service : — so much so, in- 
deed, that when he wrote home to the government, on 
account of ill health, to be relieved from the Mediterran- 
nean station, then more important than any other, he was, 
nevertheless, requested to continue at his post — which he 
patriotically did till he died ! — because the government, as 
they acknowledged, could find no adequate successor for 
him ! If we may suppose his Lordship's suggestion re- 
specting the " 5000 Irish boys" to have been complied with 
— and the supposition is not an improbable one, when we 
consider the source whence such advice emanated, and the 
superior facility of procuring sailors, as well as soldiers, in. 
Ireland, owing both to the greater want of employment 
there than in Britain, and the evident expediency of avoid- 
ing, as much as possible, the unpopularity of a frequent 
infliction of impressment in England, when it could be im- 
posed, with so much less cause for political apprehension, 
upon the less commercial, more warlike, and comparatively 
powerless or uninfluential, because religiously divided, popu- 
lation *of Ireland — if, for such apparently strong reasons, 
we may suppose his Lordship's idea to have been acted 
upon every year from 1808 till the peace in 1814, Ireland, 

as Lord Collingwood ] The courage (that's not the word,) of such a 
mere " land-lubber" as this Reviewer, is really amusing. 

With respect to Lord Collingwood's remark as to the good effects of 
mingling the Irish with English seamen, connect the following passage 
from Paine's " Common Sense," as tending to show that his Lordship's 
opinion is not to be taken as implying a superiority in the number of 
English over Irish seamen in the British navy. '* In manning a fleet," 
says Mr. Paine, addressing the then navy less Americans, to make them 
" set up for themselves" against England, by sea as well as by land,— 
"people in general run into great errors; It is not necessary that one- 
fourth part should be sailors. The Terrible privateer, Captain 
Death stood the hottest engagement of any ship last war, yet had not 
twenty sailors on board, though her complement was upwards of two 
HuxBREB. A FEW able and social sailors will soon instruct a suffi- 
cient number of active landmeyi in the common work of a ship /" For 
a short account of the noble engagement of Captain Death and his crew 
against a far superior force, consult Smollet, {Continuation of Hume, 
Index, word Death,) and compare the above opinion of Paine, and the 
result of Lord Collingwood's experience, with the very small amount 
of but 10 English to 210 Irish sailors in the vessel mentioned by Mr. 
Tone. 



156 . THE GREEN BOOK. 

in addition to her previous numbers, would have contributed 
35,000 seamen to the British fleets I So much for what 
the '* British heart and the British arm" could effect, 
during the last half century, without Irish men ; and the 
enormous amount hereafter stated, of the national debt, will 
show how much the greatness of England owes to Irish 

MONEY ! 



CHAPTER III. 

Statement (in reference to the same idea of a Union,) of the compara- 
tive size, in geographical square miles, of Ireland, and the principal 
states of Europe, with a view of her great natural capabilities for being 
a maritime power, and the peculiar military strength of her territory, 
as combined with the large amount of her population, and illustrated 

, by a plan of defensive operations, based on jVapoleon principles. 

A UNION with England must, therefore, be made agreeable 
to the will of the Irish people, emphatically speaking, or 
however party discord, the offspring of sectarian delusion, 
may occasion submission for a time, a Union with England, 
through the Mameluke medium of a numerically-ins^ignifi- 
cant, contemptibly-bigoted, shamelessly-antinational, indi- 
vidually-rapacious and politically-odious aristocracy, cannot 
and, what is more, ought not, to last.^ Magna est Veri- 
tas et pr^valebit ! As a nation, Ireland, in size, fertility, 



^ THE VISION OF A PATRIOT. 



"I had a dream which was not all a dream. — Btron.'^ 



I. 

Methought I saw a numerous host, 
On a once captive-trodden coast ; 
And every warrior's brovv^ seemed bent 
Upon a deep and dire intent. 

II. 
As mine eye this phalanx noted, 
Through the air a banner floated ; 
And a " sun-burst," as of old, 
Glittered high in rays of gold ! , 



THE GREEN BOOK. 157 

revenue, and population, even after the emaciating misrule 
of centuries, and comparatively unimproved as she is, would 

III. 

And they stretched for many a mile, 
Rank on rank, and file on file ; 
The war-horse neighed not there — for steep 
And wild the hills — the marshes deep. 

TV. 

And a shout was raised to Heaven, 
And the wrench of fetters riven, 
Seemed as if about to rattle 
Through the fiery ranks of battle ! 

Y. 

Gazing on this fixed array, 
Thus a voice was heard to say — 
('Twas not of the human race, 
But the Genius of the place) : — 

VI. 
" Rise in vengeance, rise in right, 
Rise in justice and in might ; 
Rise, each chain-enamoured slave. 
Could valour fail, you've still a grave ! 

VII. 
"Let the sword but quit the sheath, 
Bent on victory or death ; 
'Tis but the glittering blade to see — 
The chain is broke, the slave is free ! 

VIII, 
Ne'er let foreign priestcraft sever 
Freedom's sons, thus pined forever: 
Ne'er shall foreign tyrants bow 
Hearts, so linked as yours are now !" 

IX. 

At these wild, magic words did gleam 
Ten thousand swords in morn's young beam. 
Which smiled, as if all-consciousIy, 
It looked on new-born Liberty ! 

X. 

I woke, and marvelled what might mean 

This fevered vision 1 — yet I ween, 

The dream that then forsook my eyes, 

Some better day may realize ! Carolan, 

Written, under the above " nom de guerre" by a member of the 
original Comet Club, at the time of the arbitrary arrest of Mr. O'Connell, 
during the Algerine regime of the x\nglesey proclamations. 



158 THE GREEN BOOK. 

be surpassed in Christendom to-morrow by only six powers, 
France, Britain, Austria, Russia, Prussia, and Spain ; and 
perhaps, not so much surpassed by all of those powers, in 
reality, as in appearance — the Austrian and Prussian mon- 
archies consisting, not of one compact kingdom, but of 
various distinct states and people, ivishing and therefore 
liable, at some future period, to be independent.^ Taking 

1 The religious alienation from Prussia of its Polish and Rhenish 
provinces, and the aversion of many considerable portions of its terri- 
tories to their unjust incorporation with that monarchy, which has only 
risen to its present condition by the robbery of its neighbours are noto- 
rious, as well as the hostile feelings of the adjoining states on that ac- 
count, and the consequent obstacles to the permanence of such incor- 
porations. The eventual separation of the Austrian Empire into its 
primitive national elements, is still more probable, owing to the several 
considerable and naturally distinct kingdoms of which it is composed, 
and the comparative weakness of Austria proper, whose two circles or 
divisions only contain 2,200,000 souls, while Hungary has 9,000,000, 
Austrian Italy, or the Lombardo- Venetian kingdom, 4,500,000, Bo- 
hemia, about 4,000,000, and Galicia, or Austrian Poland, the best or 
most southern part of that dismembered monarchy, and about the size 
of Ireland, has a population of the s-ame amount. And all these por- 
tions of the empire, as well as others of inferior but considerable strength, 
are, we know, deeply attached to the old recollections of their distinct 
national independence, and determined to act on those recollections, 
whenever an opportunity occurs. Had Napoleon, after the victory of 
Wagram, in 1809, availed himself properly of the political advantages 
presented to him by those old national associations, he would have broken 
up the Austrian Empire, leaving its sovereign nothing more than Aus- 
tria, and have restored the various kingdoms of that empire to their 
ancient independence, by which he would have placed France in a posi- 
tion of political supremacy in reference to her continental neighbours, 
analogous to that of the Macedonian monarchy towards the states 
of ancient Greece. He would also have established himself on the 
French throne beyond all possibility of removal, since, even after the 
terrible disasters of the Russian expedition, it was only by the interposi- 
tion of Austria that he was prevented, in 1813, from reconquering Prussia, 
and beating back the Russians into their own territories, as he had done, 
in 1806 and 7. But Napoleon had no sympathy with any recollections 
or with any forms of nationality, as contrasted with the immense aggre- 
gations of military and despotic power, which eventually crushed him as 
he had crushed others. If France were to become a republic to-morrow, 
and resolve to act upon a principle opposed to Bonaparte's, by vindicat- 
ing the natural right of self-government to every nation in Europe, on 
condition of being merely repaid the expenses of their emancipation, she 
might compensate for her past errors, and attain the most glorious posi- 
tion in history that any country ever possessed. Her celebrated writer, 
M. Victor Hugo — speaking of Europe, as displaying one system of un- 



THE GREEN BOOK. 159 

Ireland, with Wakefield, to comprise 32,201 square miles, 
and comparing her with the size of other independent Euro- 
pean countries, as laid down in the Table of President Von 
Malchus,* she is 4,649 square miles larger than Portugal — 
409 larger than the kingdom of Naples and Sicily — 4,473 
larger than Bavaria and Saxony combined — 233 larger than 
Sardinia, Wurtemberg, and the Grand Duchy of Baden put 
together — 1,284 larger than Hanover, the Papal dominions, 
and the Grand Duchy of Tuscany — 351 larger than Den- 
mark added to Greece^ — and 1,429 larger than Holland, 
Belgium, and Switzerland united. In population eighteen, 
and in extent of territory, fifteen European states are in- 
ferior to Ireland.^ Her revenue — allowing for various un- 
credited articles of home consumption, credited to, because 
purchased in, England — is above £5,000,000 a year. She 
contains, according to the recent parliamentary report of the 
Irish Railway Commission, above 8,520,000 inhabitants, 
or a military population of about 2,000,000 ; while her 
insular as contrasted with the continental position of the 
nations otherwise ranking before her, would give her, under 
proper management, a defensive strength, sufficient, as the 
case of England shows, to balance or counteract almost 
every other superiority. 

just, international connexions — as presenting a general collection of lord 
and vassal, of master and slave, of politically white and black states — 
observes, in proof of his assertion, that Russia has the late kingdom 
of Poland, Prussia has Posen, another portion of that old monarchy, 
Sweden has Norway, Austria has Lombardy or Northern Italy, Naples 
has Sicily, Piedmont or Savoy has Sardinia, France herself has Corsica, 
and England has Ireland, ^' ia this condition," says he, "beside each 
nation in a natural state is seen a nation in an unnatural state." 
This list, might, as we have seen, be considerably enlarged; and, as 
regards the present connexion between England and Ireland, the senti- 
ments of such an enlightened and impartial foreigner should have their 
due weight in both countries, in leading to the formation of a firm and 
lasting, as opposed to a weak and doubtful connexion between the two 
islands. The present Union is too unjust to be satisfactory. 

' " This Table," says Mr. Butler Bryan, " is founded, as far as possi- 
ble, upon official documents: and probably no individual can have en- 
joyed better sources of correct information, than one who was succes- 
sively Minister of Finance to the former King of Westphalia, and the 
present Sovereign of Wurtemberg." 

2 The size of the kingdom of Greece, not mentioned in Von Malchus's 
Table, as not having been established when he wrote, is taken from 
other authorities. 

3 Bryan's Practical View of Ireland, chap. iv. p. 73. 



160 THE GREEN BOOK. 

To be an important commercial, and consequently naval 
power, the natural advantages of Ireland are not surpassed 
by any country in Europe. With Britain, and the, king- 
doms bordering upon the German Ocean and the Baltic, 
with France, Spain, Portugal, the coasts of Africa, the East 
and West Indies, all the eastern side of South America, the 
United States, Newfoundland, the "■ immense regions round 
Hudson's and Baffin's Bay," and with Greenland — in fine, 
with numerous nations, capable of, and interested in, receiv- 
ing and bestowing all the benefits of reciprocal commerce, 
the maritime situation of Ireland affords her an easy inter- 
course ; while her great, though at present imperfectly-de- 
veloped fertility and resources, and her large and naturally- 
intelligent population, if duly taken advantage of, would 
render her one of the greatest marts of local industry, inter- 
national communication and increasing opulence in the world. ^ 
From her superior geographical position and formation, Ire- 
land, indeed, seems intended by nature to rank above Eng- 
land as a trading and maritime power,^ since she has not 
only more harbours adapted for ships of the largest size 
than England and Wales, but more than perhaps all Europe 
can display ! The western coast of Ireland presents, for 
the space of 200 miles, a series of the very finest ports, 
from any of which an Irish ship could either reach the West 
Indies or America, before a ship from London could get out 
of the Channel ; or arrive in the New World long previous 
to an English vessel, starting from the comparatively ad- 
vantageous point of Liverpool. In addition to this, of 

' Newenham's View of Ireland, part i. sect. i. p. 5. The Politician's 
Dictionary, (Lond. 1775,) vol. i. p. 361 and 362. 

2 To this circumstance the many restrictions of England upon the 
trade of Ireland have been attributed by foreigners. The Abbe de la 
Bletterie, in a note upon the well-known passage of Tacitus, respecting 
the superiority of Irish to British commerce in Agricola's time, says, — 
" Ireland has more harbours and more convenient ports than any other 
country in Europe. England" — the Abbe speaks by comparison, — "has 
but a small number. Ireland, if she could shake off the British yoke, 
and form an independent state, would ruin the British commerce ; but" 
— continues the Abbe, — " to her misfortune England is too well convinced 
of this truth !" {Murphei/s Tacitus, p. 604, Jones' edit.) See likewise 
the Huguenot historian Rapin, {TindaVs Rapin, vol. i. p. 234,) and the 
philosopher Montesqueiu {Spirit of Laws, book xix. chap. 27;) and 
compare their statements with the sensible remarks of Lord Lyttleton, 
{Hist, of Henry II., vol. iii. p. 33 and 34,) on the unsuccessful Norwe- 
gian invasion of Ireland, in the year IIOl. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 161 

ships sailing from the majority of the Irish ports, as com- 
pared with vessels setting out from the majority of English 
ports, on a voyage to the Mediterranean, the former would 
be half over their destination before the latter could get into 
the Atlantic — a maritime advantage, on the part of Ireland, 
of which no improvements in navigation, by steam or other- 
wise, could deprive her, as such improvements would only 
be an addition of the resources of art to the benefits of na- 
ture, leaving the latter, and the superiority conferred by 
them, undiminished. The maritime counties of Ireland 
constitute two-thirds of her area. So numerous along her 
shores are either marine indentations or those caused bv the 
mouths of rivers, that there is not an acre of her soil more 
than 50 miles from the sea. The harbours or anchoring 
places average but 13 miles distance from each other; and 
six-eighths of her coast have been estimated as almost en- 
tirely free from danger to mariners. The proportion of har- 
bours in favour of Ireland, in a country so much smaller than 
England and Wales, is very considerable — those of Ireland 
being 136 in number, and those of England and Wales but 
112 — while, of the latter harbours, no 20 are to be com- 
pared with 40 of the Irish ports. Moreover, of those Eng- 
lish and Welsh harbours, a very large number, — unlike 
those of Ireland — are mere creeks and coves, ''dangerous, 
barred, and difficult of access ;" so that if, in imitation of 
England, Ireland were desirous of adding such artificial to 
her 136 natural ports, 110 miles of the Irish seacoast are 
convertible, at a comparatively easy and cheap rate, into re- 
ceptacles for shipping. In short, says the profound and in- 
dustrious Newenham, *• Most of the harbours of Ireland 
rank in all respects with the noblest in the ujorld ; seve- 
ral of them excel those of which any other country can 
boast." ^ The ffreat advantao^es for an extensive domestic 
trade and intercourse by water which the numerous tine 
lakes and rivers of Ireland afford,^ and their peculiar aptitude 
for a still further and comparatively cheap increase by canals, 
that would add as much to the natural strength of the coun- 
try in war,^ as to the commercial accommodation of its in- 

^ Newenham (part i. sect. i. p. 5, 6, 8, 12, 14, and 16,) and Butler 
Bryan, (chap. r. p. 4 and 5.) 

- Thus, ancient Egypt is mentioned by Diodorus Siculus to have been 
constantly invaded by the Arabs, who — if they were, according to some 
eminent authorities, the famous Shepherd Kings — even held that king- 

14 



162 THE GREEN BOOK. 

habitants in peace, are circumstances so obvious to any one 
who casts an eye over a map of the island, that to be ad- 
mitted, they need only be alluded to. 

The happy formation of Ireland for military defence is 
not inferior to her admirable position for commercial pur- 
poses. Ireland is in shape more circular, or like a wheel, 
than, perhaps, any other island of the same size. She is 
therefore so much the stronger, from the facility which such 
a formation affords to march, in about the same portion of 
time, from her centre or nave to all parts of her sea-girt 
felloe or circumference, a number of armies sufficient to 
meet those which any invading enemy might land upon her 
shores. Such a landing might, for example, have occurred 
in the time of the Volunteers, or in 1779, from the month 
of May to September, when the combined French and 
Spanish fleets of 50 ships of the line rode triumphantly 
through the Channel ; when England, unable to oppose the 
enemy on what she called '* her own element," was in dread 
of, and made preparation against, a descent upon her own 
coasts ; when, in reply to the application of Ireland for as- 
sistance against a similar cause for apprehension, in conse- 
quence of the country having been drained of regular troops 
for the war in America, the Irish learned that thev had no 

dom in subjection for many years. Nor were their destructive invasions 
ever effectually stopped, till the great Sesostris cut several canals from 
the Nile, and, from those canals, extended a great number of small 
trenches or dikes throughout the country ; which dikes could be filled at 
any time with water from the canals, and were thus equally serviceable 
for irrigation, and as a protection against the inroads of an equestrian 
foe. Such a system of canals and dikes, which the kings of Babylon 
are also mentioned to have made use of against the cavalry of their 
neighbours, the Medes, on the north, and the similar aggressions of the 
Arabs, on the southwest of Babylonia, would be additionally useful in 
modern warfare, by depriving the regular infantry of an invading army 
of its artillery as well as its cavalry, or the two main arms of its de- 
fence, if it intended to proceed rapidly to action, or would be scarcely 
less serviceable by fatally delaying its march, if it proposed to advance 
in conjunction with them. A regular infantry, thus partially or totally 
deprived of its chief sources of superiority over an irrep;ular infantry, 
would consequently be obliged to contend with the latter in quickness 
of movement and desultory combats, in which their chief strength would 
lie ; and be thus like a Samson with his hair shaved off, opposed to a 
Samson with his hair on. The great watery defence which the Dutch 
opposed to the formidable invasion of Louis XIV. and 130,000 men, 
under the first generals and engineers in the world, is too well known to 
be expatiated upon. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 163 

aid to expect from " the British heart and the British arm;" 
when Ireland consequently found, that '- in native swords 
and NATIVE ranks her only hope of safety dwelt ;"^ when 
Irishmen, if they chose to take advantage of and to re- 
member against England the oppression of centuries, might, 
in Lord Plunket's language, have "flung British connexion 
to the winds, and clasped the independence of their country 
to their hearts ;"2 and, in fine, when, instead of acting thus, 

' What a very different spectacle Ireland presents on this occasion, 
when told by the British government to provide for her own defence 
against the French and Spaniards, compared whh the Britons, when 
they were enjoined by the Roman emperor Honorius to do the same with 
respect to the Scots, Picts, and Saxons ! The historical parallel between 
the political circumstances of England and Ireland at those two periods 
is complete, and the contrast in the conduct of the two countries is as 
honourable to Ireland, as it is the direct opposite to her insular neighbour. 
Ireland, a dependency of England, was, when the Volunteers arose, de- 
prived of all the regular forces of her English protectors, and of a large 
amount of her own natives among them, for the contest in America. Bri- 
tain, a province of Rome, in the time of Honorius, was stripped of all the 
legions or regular forces of her Roman protectors, and of numbers of her 
own youth, who had been conveyed over to the continent to take part in 
the civil or foreign wars of Rome. But, though a naval -invasion from 
the triumphant armaments of the French and Spaniards was so much 
more formidable than the power of the Scots, Picts, and Saxons, the 
Irish never disgraced themselves by such a document as this petition of 
the Britons, in 446, to the Roman general ^tius, for assistance. " To 
^tius, thrice consul, the groans of the Britons. The barbarians drive 
us to the sea, the sea throws us back on the swords of the barbarians ; so 
that w^e have nothing left us but the wretched choice of being either 
drowned or butchered !" (Henry's Hist, of Great Britain, vol. i. p. 
129.) These base " groans" met with no more aid than they deserved ; 
but, though not creditable to his countrymen, they should not have been 
completely suppressed, in his History of England, by Dr. Lingard. 

2 See in Barrington's Rise and Fall of the Irish Nation, p. 82, the ac- 
count of the meeting of Lieutenant Doyne and the 2d regiment of 
Horse, on Essex Bridge, with a body of Volunteers under Lord Alta- 
mont, in which the regular forces thought proper to give way to the 
latter. See also, in p. 173 and 4 of the same work, the description of the 
strength and preparations of the Volunteer Army, for real service, in 
case " the British heart and the British arm " did not think proper to 
surrender the usurped legislative independence of Ireland. 

O Liberty ! can men resign thee, 

Once having felt thy generous flame ] 

Can dungeons, bolts, and bars confine thee, 
Or whip thy noble spirits tame 1 

The principles of national independence, so triumphantly vindicated by 



164 THE GREEN BOOK. 

they came to the memorable decision of standing or faUing 
with England in the hour of her weakness, for which they 
were afterwards so basely requited by the annihilation of 
their national independence at the UnionJ 

Whatever has happened once may happen again. France, 
Russia, and the United States, possess far more formidable 
strength now than France, Spain, and Holland, the mari- 
time opponents of England during the American war, did 

those men, were condemned, as contained in Molyneux's book, to be 
burned by the common hangman only about 80 years before, and were 
proscribed, still later, in the person of Doctor Lucas. But the phoenix 
of Irish legislative nationality arose from its ashes; and if Ireland, like 
Sir Malice Ravenswood in the story, only " bides her time^'' the hour 
MUST sooner or later arrive, when she may be again as great, or greater, 
than she has ever yet been. 

To act, to suffer, may be truly great — 
But nature's noblest effort is — to wait ! 

' The ingratitude of the British government at the Union, in forcing 
that measure upon Ireland at the time of her distress, though Ireland, in 
the period of her strength under the Volunteers, had adhered so faith- 
fully to England in the hour of her weakness, is calculated to remind 
audi .almost to identify the political feelings of every true Irishman with 
those of the Tyrolese peasant mentioned by the late Mr. Inglis, in the 
account of his journey through the Tyrol. The bold and loyal struggle 
against the superior power of France and Bavaria, and in favour of an 
Austrian "connexion," which was made, in 1809, by the heroic Hofer 
and his brave rural volunteers," is well known. Austria, how-ever, has 
since taken such a method of evincing her gratitude to the noble Tyro- 
lese for their endeavours to " maintain the connexion between the two 
countries," that — though, by the way, Tyrol has not been stripped of 
its DOMESTIC LEGISLATURE as Ireland has been — the government of 
Austria is deservedly detested. In the course of a conversation with 
one of those gallant peasants on the unworthy conduct of Austria to 
his country, Mr. Inglis asked this ' village Hampden* if he had ever borne 
a rifle 1 " We were walking," says that gentleman, " up a steep moun- 
tain path : he stopped, — faced round, — leaned upon his rod, — and, in 
almost a whisper, said, ' Sir, I carried a rifle, and used it, too ; but in a 
BAD cause. Hofer was a hero ; Speckbacker whom I followed was a 
hero; Haspinger was a hero ; but they were all three fools ! Our balls 

WERE all spent IN DEFENCE OF AuSTRIA .* and let mC tell you THIS 

arm can carry a rifle yet, — but not for Austria !' ' But,' said I, 
If not under the government of Austria, under what government 
'WOULD the Tyrol place itself V ' Under the government of Tyro- 
leans,' said he ; ' Switzerland is free, and respected ; and your govern- 
tnent has recognised its republic : have we shown less ardour in de- 
fence of our privileges than the Swiss 1 but no matter ; our turn is at 



HAND! 



I>» 



THE GREEN BOOK. 165 

THEN ; while, owing to her enormous national debt, or 
what Lord Brougham has called the '' bond for ^800,000,000 
to keep the peace"^ — her internal political divisions — her 
bloated and unsound extent of foreign or colonial dominion^ 
— and, above all, owing to the great progress made by other 
nations, since the last war, in manufactures, commerce, and 
naval power^ — England could never again display such 
efforts on land or sea, as she has done. If, then, any such 
emergency or necessity for self-protection should occur in 
Ireland again, as took place in the time of the Volunteers, 

' The clearest idea that has been yet conveyed of the enormous 
amount of the National Debt, and the corruption of the system of 
government that produced it, is given in the follow^ing passage from a 
tract pubHshed by the Chard Political Union, and very properly printed 
as an appendix to Watson's edition of ''Paine's Political Works." 

^^ George the Third came to the throne in 1760. He found the na- 
tional debt 120 millions, he reigned fifty-nine years, and left it above 
820 millions, being 700 millions more than at his accession, increasing 
on the whole period of his reign about thirty-six thousand pounds every 
day^ or twenty-three pounds every minute !! .' At the beginning of 
his reign, the taxes were six millions ; at his death he left them at above 
SIXTY millions! . . . Taking the national debt at eight hundred and fifty 
millions, it will weigh very nearly seven thousand tons in sovereigns ; 
it would take a man sixty-four years to count it over, allowing him to 
count fifty sovereigns in a minute, and work twelve hours a-day ; it 
would load as many waggons as would extend eighty miles in a direct 
line, allowing each waggon to carry one ton, and to occupy twenty 
y-ards. The interest of the sum is thirty millions ; and is drawn by taxes 
from the farming, manufacturing, and labouring people of England. 
This annual interest would load as many waggons as would extend 
over three miles in a direct line, with one ton weight of sovereigns in 
each ! ! !" 

2 The Indian empire of England must, to use Heeren's expression, 
" break down by its own weight." Colonel Napier calculated the regu- 
lar force which England required for her colonial possessions so far back 
as 1808, as no less than between 50 and 60.000 men ; and those pos- 
sessions have been considerably added to, since that time. The Duke 
of Wellington, as reported in the Morning Herald of March 9th, 1830, 
referred full half of the expenses of the mihtary establishment of Eng- 
land to the colonies, the preservation of which Sir Henry Hardinge 
admitted to be *• in effect a war-service in time o^ peace /" 

2 Colonel Keatinge, in his ^^Defence of Ireland^ written in 1795 or 
6, well observed what succeeding events are, and have, for some time, 
been in the way of, accomplishing. "England," said he, "for man)' 
years engrossed the trade and wealth of the universe, without a rival, 
and founded her splendour on it. But it is not in the nature of things 
that it can be always so ; trade will in time find its kvel, and all cannot 
be gainers." (Chap. xi. p. 80.) 

14-^ 



166 THE GREEN BOOK. 

let us suppose that we could muster a force of 200,000 
men, or only about twice the number of the Volunteer Army 
then, although our population is more than doubled now.^ 
Let Athlone be fixed upon as the national head-quarters or 
those of a Grand Army of the Centre, amounting to 100,000 
men. Let these 100,000 men have the care of the princi- 
pal magazine of artillery, ammunition, provisions, money, 
<fec., intended for the public defence ; and act, in fine, as a 
sort of heart to the country, by extending to its extremities 
the current of martial vitality. Of the remaining 100,000 
men, form four provincial armies or military spokes, each 
of 25,000 men. Let each of these four spokes be at once 
in communication with and stretching along from the Grand 
Army of the Centre in four lines, running as much as may 
be deemed requisite N. W. and N.E. and S. W. and S.E. 
to the corresponding parts of the coast of Ireland. Then, — 
speaking with reference to the four divergent armies or 
provincial military spokes, just mentioned, — let four less or 
intermediate ones, each of these to consist of 10,000 men, 
be kept ready for action by the Grand Army of the Centre, 
which, exclusive of them, would still constitute a reserve 
of 60,000 troops. In order to allow every advantage, and 
even much greater advantages than could be reasonably 
claimed by those who assert the inability of Ireland to stand 

^ Belgium and Holland, whose united population is not equal to that 
of Ireland, each maintain a military establi^^hment, at present, of above 
100,000 men ; and, according to Moore's Life of Lord Edward Fitzge- 
rald, there were, in 1798, no less than 279,896 names on the muster-roll 
of the United Irishmen, exclusive of the large numbers of Irish in the 
MiUtia and Yeomanry, whose services were so great in the suppression 
of the insurrection, that the present Lord Plunket attributed the putting 
down of the rebellion, not to " the British heart and the British arm," 
but to Irish "zeal and loyalty." — {Speech against the Union, in Phil- 
lips's Specimens of Irish Eloquence, p. 401.) The Irish Militia alone 
were 18,000 strong. And yet we hear of an English " conquest of Ire- 
land !" If Ireland, however, were but true to herself, she never could 
be conquered by England or by any other country on earth ; and, though 
she does not occupy the political position which she ought to possess, 
yet her fall may be attributed, like that of Argantes in Tasso, as much 
to herself as to any efforts of her enemy. 

Then, spent in empty air thy strength in vain, 

Thou fall'st, Argantes ! headlong on the plain ; 

Thoufall'st! (yet unsubdued alike in all) 

None but thyself can boast Argantes* fall! 
For " empty air'' read " empty feuds,'' and the picture is complete. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 167 

against a foreign aggression without '*the British heart and 
the British arm" — let us next take for granted, that an in- 
vader could land four armies in Ireland, on four different 
points of the coast, each of these armies being as numerous 
as each of the four provincial armies or military spokes 
appointed to meet them. It is, in that case, evident, that 
such an enemy must succeed in disembarking in front of 
the four great military spokes, or between some two out 
of the FOUR of them. If he disembarks his four armies in 
front of the four native provincial armies or military spokes, 
and they retreat on Athlone for reinforcements, the four 
minor or intermediate spokes of 10,000 men can then issue 
from the Grand Army of the Centre and delay his opera- 
tions, by subdividing themselves, and flanking, on both 
sides, with 5,000 men, or 10,000 in all, each of the enemy's 
four successful armies; while the four native armies can 
meantime enjoy the advantage of returning reinforced to 
combat against a hostile force, necessarily diminished by 
its previous losses in an enemy's territory. On the other 
hand, in case the invader's four armies should land betiveen 
the four great provincial military spokes, then, exclusive of 
the smaller spokes of 10,000 men each, in his front, and 
capable of being still further strengthened from the Athlone 
Grand Centre of 60,000 in their rear, he must have an Irish 
army of 25,000, or, if divided, of 12,500 men, on each of 
his flanks, and threatening l\is communication with the sea, 
could it be possible for him, under such circumstances, to 
advance far into or towards the centre of the country. Or 
if, with the intention of clearing his ivay round the island, 
before an advance into it, he should divide each of his 
armies of 25,000 into two bodies of 12,500, in order to 
make the four native armies do the same, each of these 
invading subdivisions of 12,500 men would, indeed, be pro- 
tected in its rear by one of a similar amount, and would be 
guarded, on one of its flanks, by the sea ; but in both these 
advantages the subdivided Irish armies would equally par- 
ticipate, while, on the side towards the interior or centre of 
the island, the smaller or intermediate spokes of 10,000 men 
each could protect the flank of the Irish and annoy the 
enemy's in the same direction — to say nothing of the fur- 
ther advance of the Grand Army of the Centre to the assist- 
ance of the four great and four smaller native armies or 
military spokes, by which co-operation the whole of the 



168 THE GREEN BOOK. 

hostile force could not escape being destroyed, captured, or 
driven out of the country I If, finally, according to the only 
alternative that remains to be considered, the invader should 
so far '* strive with things impossible and get the better of 
them," as to drive in all the provincial and minor armies 
of the island upon that of the Centre at Athlone, he would 
there have to meet, with his harassed and lessened force, a 
consolidated mass of troops augmented by a numberless 
amount of enthusiastic irreorulars, armed with Montecuculi's 
"queen of weapons," the pike, of which General Cockburn 
said, that even, in 1804, there were "materials, carpenters 
and smiths enough to arm all Ireland in a fortnight!"^ 
But, this is a position of Phocian desperation to which 
such a country as Ireland, if united in herself, could never 
be driven.^ 

1 Military Observations respecting Ireland, &c., p. 57. Sir Jonah 
Barrington says, that in 1782, the Volunteers would have been aided, 
in case of a war, by "a million of enthusiasts !" and how much more 
could Ireland furnish now than it could then ? 

2 Every Irish reader will, of course, recollect the noble passage in 
poor Emmet's speech, in contemplation of Ireland's being placed in such 
a position as the above : — 

" God forbid that I should see my country under the hands of a foreign 

power When it has liberty to maintain and independence to 

keep, may no consideration induce it to submit ! If the French come as a 
foreign enemy, oh my countrymen ! meet them on the shore with a torch 
in one hand — a sword in the other : receive them with all the destruction 
of war — immolate them in their boats, before our native soil shall be pol- 
luted by a foreign ioe ! If they succeed in landing, fight them on the 
strand, burn every blade of grass before them, as they advance ; raze every 
house ; and, if you are driven to the centre of your country, collect your 
provisions, your property, your wives and your daughters — form a circle 
around them — fight while two men are left ; and when but one remains, 
let that man set fire to the pile, and release himself and the families of 
his fallen countrymen from the tyranny of France !" The bold enthusi- 
asm of these ideas of Mr. Emmet, in reference to a hostile French inva- 
sion of Ireland, is conceived in the true spirit of those brilliant periods 
of ancient patriotism and bravery w^ith the history of which his classical 
imagination was so familiar. " When on the point of sinking under the 
power of the Thessalians, who had invaded their country with superior 
forces," says the author of iVnacharsis respecting the Phocians, ''they 
constructed a large pile, near which they placed their women, their 
children, their gold and silver, and all their valuable effects, and left them 
under the care of thirty of their warriors, with orders, in case of a defeat, 
to kill the women and children, to throw every thing into the flames, 
and either to destroy each other, or repair to the field of battle and perish 
with the rest of the nation. The conflict was long, the slaughter dread- 



THE GREEN BOOK. 169 

The above outline of a system of defending Ireland 
against an invader is analogous in substance to the plan 
adopted by Napoleon in Spain, in 1808, with this advan- 
tage in favour of Ireland, that her forces would be fighting 
in their own, and consequently in a friendly country, 
whereas Napoleon's armies in Spain were in a foreign and 
a hostile territory. Again, the French, besides fighting 
against the military, had also to watch over and keep down 
the civil population of Spain. They had, moreover, to 
maintain a long, intricate, and continually-menaced com- 
munication with France, since, from it alone, the imperial 
forces could draw any recruits to make up for the *' wear 
and tear" of war. Colonel Napier's description of the 
mode in which Napoleon distributed his troops in the Pe- 
ninsula, after hearing of the commotion at Aranjuez, is to 
the following efi'ect. The French, while ranged with refer- 
ence to the occupation of the most important points, were 
so stationed with respect to Murat's head-quarters at Ma- 
drid, (at once the capital, and the centre, or Athlone of Spain,) 
that from that Grand Centre, as regarded the entire king- 
dom, and from the subordinate centres connected with it, 
and formed by the respective head-quarters of the French 
armies branching into the provinces, (on the principle of the 
four Irish military spokes of 25,000 men,) the forces of no 

ful, the Thessalians took to flight, and the Phocians remained free !" — 
{Travels of Anacharsis^ chap. xxii. vol. ir. p. 29.) See, likewise, the 
undaunted conduct of the Xanthians and Caunians, when invaded by 
Harpagus, Ueutenant of Cyrus, {Herodotus, i. 176.;) and, again, of the 
Xanthians, when invested by I3rutus {Fliitarch, vit. Bruti, Appian, 
torn.. II. p. 632-3, edit. Schweighasuser. ,-) of Boges, the Persian governor 
of Eion, in Thrace, against the Greeks under Cimon, (Herod, vii. 107. 
Plutarch, vit. Cimon. ;) of the Sidonians, against Darius Ochus, king 
of Persia, (Diodorus Siculus, xyi. 45. edit. Wesseling. ;) of the Mar- 
marians, a Lycian people, against Alexander the Great, {Diodorus^ 
XVII. 28 ;) of the Saguntines, when attacked by Hannibal, (Livy, xxi. 
14. Appia?!, torn. j.p. 113-14;) of the Acarnanians, when menaced 
with a Roman and ^^tolian invasion, (Livy, xxvi. 25;) of Astapa, a 
Spanish city, when besieged by Marcius, the lieutenant of Scipio, {Livy, 
xxviii. 22-23, Appian, torn. i. p. 140-41 ; of Abydus, in similar cir- 
cumstances, against Philip II. of Macedon, (Livy, xxxi. 17-18. Poly- 
bius, torn. XYI. p. 629 — 637, edit. Schwelgh. ,•) and, lastly, the glorious 
end of the noble wife of Asdrubal at the destruction of Carthage, dying 
like an emblem of the lofty genius of her country, amidst the last con- 
flagration of its last uncaptured fortress ! (Appian, torn. i. p. 491-493. 
Tertullian, p. 72 <Sf 157. edit, Rigalt. Zonarus, lib, ix. torn, i.jo. 469.) 



170 THE GREEN BOOK. 

three of those Spanish provinces (such forces being similar 
to the invader's armies in Ireland between her occupying 
military spokes,) could act in concert without first beating 
a French corps ;" while, adds Colonel Napier, '' if any of 
the Spanish armies succeeded in routing a French force^ 
the remaining corps could unite ivlthout difficulty and re- 
treat ivithout danger r^ though, as has been before observed, 
they were not in a friendly but a hostile territory. By 
this plan Napoleon enabled 70,000 men, the greater part 
of whom were mere raw recruits, to maintain themselves 
in a strong and spacious country, inhabited by 11,000,000 
of a proud, fierce, fanatical, and exasperated population, 
who, as the Colonel remarks, were sufficient to have tramp- 
pled the French under foot, were the latter not so skilfully 
disposed.^ On such a Napoleon system of military ar- 
rangement, containing all the inherent strength, unaffected 
by any of the weakness, incidental to the position of the 
French in Spain, might Ireland be triumphantly defended 
against any foreign power, however formidable, either by 
means of a completely Irish or a popular Anglo-Irish army, 
receiving support and assistance from a friendly country, 
instead of being situated, like the French, in the midst of 
a hostile nation. 

The local advantages which a native army, defending 
Ireland and British connexion, would possess over a foreign 
enemy, may be divided into the two heads of general and 
PARTICULAR. The first of these are well summed up and 
illustrated in the following words of the great Frederick of 
Prussia. " War," says Frederick, '' must be carried on, 
either in our own, or in a neutral, or in an enemy's country. 
If I had no view but to my own glory, I would always pre- 
fer making my own dominions the seat of war. As there 
every man serves for a spy, and the enemy cannot stir a 
step without its being known, I can then send out large or 
small parties without apprehension, and make any move- 
ments I please without risk ! If the enemy is beaten, every 
peasant becomes a soldier, and harasses the enemy ! Of 
that the elector Frederick William had experience, after the 
battle of Ferhbellin, where the peasants killed more of the 
Swedish soldiers, than there were slain in the action ; and 
the same circumstance happened to me after the battle of 

» History of the Peninsular War, vol. i. p. 45, 47, 48, 53, 55, 58, 
and 59. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 171 

Hohenfriedberg, where the mountaineers of Silesia brought 

me in a multitude of Austrian prisoners That party 

always has the advantage which is able to obtain the good 
will of the people ! ... In regard to detachments, &;c., all 
that must be entirely regulated by the good or ill disposition 
of the common people towards you!"^ Thus much for 
the GENERAL advantages which a native army would pos- 
sess in the defence of this country ; and even without taking 
into consideration the natural military strength of the in- 
terior surface of the island, the particular advantages that 
would result from the nature of the climate, in connexion 
with the hardy habits of the mass of the population, would 
be of still greater importance. The climate of Ireland is 
the moistest in Europe, — that portion of the year in which 
frost and snow are prevalent elsewhere being damp and 
rainy in this country. Sir John Pringle, the celebrated 
army-physician, has observed, that the mortality of an army 
in a winter-campaign is far less extensive on account of 
frost than of moisture ; and this fact has occasioned Colonel 
Keatinge's remark, that, in reference to the health of those 
engaged in active military operations, '' an advanced season 
of the year," or, in other words, from September to May, 
would be " always fatal to foreigners in this country J^^ 
On the other hand, " the natives of Ireland," says a famous 
military writer, '' suffer not from this ever-moist atmosphere. 
They hav^e been formed to it. The institutions and autho- 
rities under which, for 600 years, they have lived, have 
condemned all the laborious and effective part of the 
population to a straw bed, laid upon their native clay, for 
their repose Hence, this hardy population sets the se- 
verity of the Irish climate at defiance. Captain Rock can 
answer for the security with which that population can sus- 
tain a contirmed bivouac. His troops have always chosen 
the depth of the Irish luinter as the most congenial season 

for THEIR operations No other state of life can equal 

the hardiness in which these people have been and are, by 
such means, reared !" The cheap abundance, too, of the 
vegetable diet on which, and a draught of water or butter- 
milk, the Irish peasantry are accustomed to subsist, in a 
manner that makes the Spartan broth of antiquity appear 
comparative epicurism, and " the rations of the modern 
soldier, to their abstinence, a succession of gormandizing," 
• Cited from Colonel Keatinge's work, chap. xi. p. 82 and 83. 



172 THE GREEN BOOK. 

would give an army and a peasantry reared to live in such 
a way, under such a climate as that of Ireland, incalculable 
advantages in defending their native country against the 
comparatively delicate and effeminate troops of a foreign 
enemy. The plenty with which the Irish might be supplied 
by the military root that forms their usual sustenance, and 
the natural facilities which it would afford of being concealed 
from an enemy in pits, are unequalled by any other de- 
scription of food. '* The produce of an acre of potatoes," 
says Mr. W. G. Andrews, in an Essay on the Properties, 
Habits, and Culture of the Potato,'' ''will furnish sub- 
sistence for SIX men for a whole year, whereas, an acre of 
wheat will scarcely supply food for two men !" — and again, 
" the potatoes kept in houses, in large quantities, have 
failed to a much greater extent than those kept in pits, the 
tendency to heating and fermentation being greater, owing 
to the closer situation and the greater quantity accumu- 
lated."^ 

With these particulars combine the reflections suggested 
by the subjoined passages from an ancient and a modern 
writer, and no country can present a picture of more 
NATURAL defensive invincibility than Ireland ! " Csesar," 
says Plutarch, in his account of the operations against 
Pompey's camp in Epirus, " offered battle to Pompey, who 
was encamped in an advantageous manner, and abundantly 
supplied with provisions both from sea," of which his fleet 
were masters, " and land ; whereas Caesar at first had no 
great plenty, and afterwards was in extreme want. The 
soldiers, however, found great relief from a root in the 
adjoining fields,'' called cldera or char a, which some of 
them, who had served in Sardinia, learned to make bread of, 
and "which they prepared in milk. Sometimes, they made 
it into bread, and going up to the enemy's advanced guards, 
threw it in among them, and declared, — ' That as long as 
the earth produced such roots, they would certainly be- 
siege Pompey I' Pompey," continues Plutarch, "would 
not suffer either such bread to be produced, or such speeches 
to be reported in his camp ; for his men were already dis- 
couraged, and ready to shudder at the thought of the im- 
penetrable hardness of Caesar's troops, who could bear as 

^ From a citation and review of Mr. Andrews's Essay in the Morn- 
ing Register J March 4th, 1 835. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 173 

much as so many wild beasts."^ The other citation, allud- 
ed to, is an abridged extract from Dalrymple's Memoirs 
of Great Britain and Ireland. '' The chief disorders," says 
that historian, in his account of the war between James and 
William in Ireland, " came from the lowest class of the na- 
tion, called Rapparees. The genius of nations often depends 

upon the food with which they are nourished The 

potato root upon which most of the common people of 
Ireland, at that time, subsisted, while it increased the popu- 
lation, debased the character of the nation f because a man, 

' Langhorne's Plutarch, p. 508, Tegg's edit. Duncan's Caesar, p. 
267, Jones's edit. It is not a little remarkable, that this root-bread was 
invented — and "necessity is the mother of invention," — in Sardinia. 
This Island, as Muller, the German Thucydides, observes, is by nature 
one of the most fertile on earth ; but, on being conquered by Carthage, 
it was turned into a mere " draw-farm ;" deprived of any commerce, un- 
less with its mercantile tyrant ; and, in fine, treated with such barbarity 
that neither the country nor its inhabitants have ever recovered the 
effects of the African dominion, even to the present day ! Has the treat- 
ment of any other fertile island, by any other mercantile state, borne 
any resemblance to that of Sardinia by Carthage ] 

2 The statement of Dalrymple, that the potato has debased the cha- 
racter, while it has increased the numbers, of the people of Ireland, 
is a favourite axiom amongst British, but more especially Scotch, 
"felosofers " and their Tory echoes in this country. Such an assertion, 
if in any degree, is, at most, very partially true. The real reason of 
this debasement, if any such exists, is to be found, not in the potato, 
but in the causes that have brought down the mass of the Irish people 
to live on the potato or to starve; and these causes, in a pre-eminently 
rich and fertile country, transporting, at present, between sixteen and 
eighteen millions worth of provisions every year, are to be traced to the 
combined effects of foreign and domestic, of British and Tory misgo- 
vernment and plunder, or what their prime representative and champion, 
Pitt himself, acknowledged to be, the " depriving Ireland of the benefit 
of her own resources for English objects." Build a wall of brass around 
Ireland, according to Bishop Berkeley's idea, or in other words, leave her 
to subsist merely on her own natural resources, and every man, woman, 
and child, in Ireland, might eat meat, and plenty of it, every day in the 
year. And, as to any debasement amongst the population of Ireland, if 
debasement, in the words of the song, means " poorness of spirit, noi 
poorness of purse," there is not a more undebased peasantry in Europe 
than the Irish. With respect to their own private or local wrongs, no 
peasantry more frequently let tyranny know how deeply they feel and 
how boldly they resent those wrongs, in patiently submitting to which 
they could alone be pronounced a debased population. With respect to 
intellectual powers and education, the common Irish are more witty, 
clever, and social, and more of them can read and write, as the published 
returns show, than the peasantry of England. The real debasement 

15 



174 THE GREEN BOOK. 

by the work of a few days, could raise as much food as 
was sufficient to maintain him during the rest of the year. 
The Rapparee was the lowest of the low people. He lived 
in the country upon that root alone. In his clothing, he 
was half naked. His house consisted of a mud wall, and a 
few branches of trees, covered with grass or bushes, ...a 

fabric that could be erected in an hour The Rapparees... 

rendezvoused during the night, coming to some solitary station 
from an hundred places at once, by paths which none else 
knew. There, in darkness and deserts, they planned their 
mischievous expeditions. Their way of conducting them 
was, sometimes to make incursions from a distance in small 
bodies, which, as they advanced, being joined at appointed 
places by others, grew greater and greater every hour ; and, 
as they made these incursions when the moon was quite 
dark, it became impossible to trace their steps, except by 
the cries of those they were murdering, or the flames of 
the houses, barn-yards, and villages which they burnt as 

they went along It was difficult to detect, or to guard 

against them till too late.... They carried the locks of their 
muskets in their pockets, or hid them in dry holes of old 
walls, and they laid the muskets themselves charged, and 
closely corked up at the muzzel and touch-hole, in ditches, 
with which they were acquainted. So that bodies of regular 
troops often found themselves defeated in an instant, they knew 
not how or from whence. Their retreat was equally swift and 
safe ; because they ran off into bogs^ by passages with which 
others were unacquainted, and hiding themselves in the un- 
equal surfaces formed by the bog-grass, or laying themselves 
all along, in muddy water, with nothing but the mouth and 
nostrils above, it became more easy to find game than the 
fugitives !"2 Ireland has now a population as hardy and 

that exists in Ireland, and keeps her as she is, prevails not amongst her 
potato but her meat eaters, not amongst her water but her wine drink- 
ers, not amongst her wearers of fi'lze but of broadcloth. 

^ About a fourth part of Ireland is composed of bogs, which are gene- 
rally impassable to horse and artillery, and are as favourable to the 
movements of an irregular as unfavourable to those of a regular in- 
fantry. 

2 Memoirs of Great Britain and Ireland, p. 511-12. The reader and 
admirer of Gibbon will recollect and compare with this description of 
Dalrymple the account given of the Sclavonians, whose rapid inroads 
and destructive hostilities were so formidable to the Roman empire in 
Justinian's time. " In the field," says the Roman historian, " the Sola- 



THE GREEN BOOK. 175 

more numerous and better educated than it has ever yet 
been — so that, if properly organized against a foreign inva- 
sion, it may well be said, in the language of the English 
writer, Wakefield, in 1812, that '* a country having such 
defenders, and capable of supplying one army after another 
in succession, luould rise superior to every defeat,^ and the 
loss of a battle would only be a stimulant to a more vigo- 
rous and successful exertion J^' 



CHAPTER IV. 

Examination of the assertion of Voltaire and others, that the Irish " have 
always fought badly at home," and confutation of that assertion, by 
an account of what men, and how much domestic dissension and 
money enabled England to terminate the Elizabeth ian and Crom- 
wellian wars. 

Voltaire, indeed, though he admits the goodness of the 
Irish as soldiers abroad, ventures to infer — from his notion 
of their having always fought badly at home — from the 
mere occurrence of Ireland's annexation to England — and 
from his own extremely narrow and erroneous idea of the 
battle of the Boyne and the whole of the Irish war between 
the adherents of James and William — that Ireland is one of 
those countries which " seem made to be subject to ano- 
ther."^ But as, in the language of Dryden, 

vonian infantry was dangerous by their speed, agility, and hardiness ; 
they swam, they dived, they remained under water, drawing their breath 
through a hollow cane ; and a river or lake was often the scene of their 
unsuspected ambuscade !" Gibbon, indeed, adds, that " these were the 
achievements of spies or stragglers ; the military art was unknown to the 
Sclavonians ; their name was obscure and their conquests inglorious." 
But the military art has been made known to the Russians, the descend- 
ants of those Sclavonians, as it was to the Irish in the French service, 
and, since it has been known, have the names of either been obscure, or 
their conquests inglorious ] The Russians may speak, as they have 
acted, on their own account! — and, as for us, "mere Irish," perhaps 
the " raw material" of the 600,000 men, who, according to Newenham, 
fought in the various continental services, during the last century, and 
of those who have constituted two-thirds of " the British heart and the 
British arm" in this, may not be altogether " obscure" and "inglo- 
rious !" We have seen and shall see. 

^ Oeuvres de Voltaire, (Siecle de Louis XIV., chap, xv.) torn. xx. p. 
408, edit. 1785 



176 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Errors, like straws, upon the surface flow — 

They, who would seek for pearls, must dive below ! 

SO, in this superficial assertion, Voltaire can have no greater 
credit attached to his opinion — though a favourite one 
among a certain class of politicians, — than a judicious 
thinker should annex to a mere rapid and arbitrary gene- 
ralization from a hurried and imperfect view of facts, with- 
out any endeavour to form a due conception of the causes 
from which those facts arose. As to Ireland's political 
junction with England, it took more than four hundred 
years to accomplish, notwithstanding the total national dis- 
organization, the continual divisions, and even the constant, 
bitter, and sanguinary hostilities of the Irish against each 
other. But for these circumstances, it is admitted by Le- 
land himself — an historian, from his collegiate bigotry and 
clerical emoluments, no friend to his country's emancipa- 
tion — that the native chieftains, by even a moderate degree 
of union among themselves, could have often destroyed — 
as, indeed, they long kept tributary — the comparatively 
tolerated and insiornificant feebleness of the Endish Pale in 
Ireland. A mere allusion to the defeat of Richard II. by 
Arth MacMurchad O'Cavenagh, and to the results of that 
defeat, is sufficient to establish the truth of this assertion. 
It was not until the bloody battle of Knocktow, in 1504, 
in which, too, the Earl of Kildare, the king of England's 
deputy, had/ar more native Irish troops on his side than 
men of English birth or descent^ that the Pale only began 
to be raised to any thing that deserved even the name of an 
English government in Ireland, or rather in a portion of 
Ireland ; and an anecdote that is related, on English au- 
thority, to have occurred on the field of Knocktow between 
two Irish lords, Kildare and Gormanstown, shows, from 
the discord and hatred between the Irish, how little a peo- 
ple so divided could ever be said to be conquered as a na- 
tion by England. Lord Gormanstown turning, in the 
elation of victory, to Kildare, said, "- We have slaughtered 
our enemies, but to complete the good deed, we must pro- 
ceed yet further — cut the throats of the Irish of our own 
party r^ — to which Kildare coolly replied, " 'Tis too soon 
YET !'" — The final submission of Ireland did not, however, 

^ See Taaffe's History, 1st vol. passim^ and for the above anecdote, 
p. 311-12. See, also, MacGeoghegan's History, vol. ii. p. 377. — 
O'Kelly's translation. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 177 

occur till towards the close of Elizabeth's reign, after the 
protracted, bloody, and expensive contest against O'Neill 
and O'Donnell, which was terminated by the consequences 
of the victory of Lord Mountjoy over these brave and long- 
triumphant chieftains,' at the fatal battle of Kinsale, in De- 
cember, 1601. And HOW this submission of Ireland was 
realized, will be best conceived from the facts — that, though 
Elizabeth's revenue "fell much short of .£500,000 a year," 
Ireland, in ten years, cost the Queen, according to her mi- 
nister Cecil's admission, no less than £3,400,000, which 
may be called, in the wondering or sceptical language of 
Hume, " an incredible sum for that age'>' — that, in only 
six months of one year, 1599, the public service of Ireland 
came to £600,000 ! — that, by the statement of the Lords 
of the Council, the average annual charge of the English 
military establishment in Ireland, which was usually as 
high as 20,000 men, came to £300,000, at a time when, as 
has been before observed, the revenue of Eno^land was 
'' much short of £500,000 a year !" — that, after some of 
the best English commanders, who had distinguished them- 
selves on the Continent, were baffled in Ireland, the gallant 
Essex, with a well-appointed army of no less than 20,000 
infantry and 2,000 cavalry, was able to effect nothing of 
consequence against the Irish — that all the above-mentioned 
outlay of money was exclusive of large contributions by 
Ireland herself to put down the Queen's enemies — that the 
majority of the Irish nobility and gentry and all the great 
corporate towns were on the side of Elizabeth — that, if the 
Irish had joined with the Spaniards, at Kinsale, as numer- 
ously as, if directed by a spirit of national unanimity, they 
would have done, it appears that Kinsale could not have 
been taken — and lastly, and above all, that, according to 
the acknowledgment of Lord Mountjoy's secretary, the 
historian Moryson, more than one half of the army that 

' The Abbe MacGeoghegan, in his enumeration of those who fought 
in the last war in Ireland against Elizabeth, very properly " begins with 
Ulster, because," says he, " the inhabitants of that province were the 

chief actors in the war If their example had been followed, 

continues the patriotic Abbe, " the sway of the English would have 
been inevitably destroyed in Ireland!" — {History^ vol. iii. p, 186.) 
This spirit showed itself amongst the Presbyterians of Ulster, in the 
time of the Volunteers, and at another time that need not be mentioned 
— but where is it now 1 Echo answers, Scotch "poleetikil occonnomy ^^ 
and '' regium donumJ^ 

15* 



178 THE GREEN BOOK. 

gained the decisive action of Kinscde against O^Neill and 
O'DonnelU and which, though receiving less pay, was ex- 
posed to the chief brunt of the engagement, was composed 
of Irishmen !^ So much, in this instance, for what some, 
with Voltaire, may choose to call an English '* conquest 
of Ireland !" The reduction of this country, in the time 
of Cromwell, can be as little entitled to the designation of 
an English " conquest of Ireland," owing to the religious 
and political divisions amongst its inhabitants; but, more 
particularly, to the base defection to Cromwell, through 
Lord Broghill's intrigues, of the forces of Lord Inchiquin, 
with the numerous garrison-towns and fortresses of Mun- 
ster which he had under his command, and which the Irish 
had been at an '' excessive charge" in supplying with every 
necessary during the preceding summer. 

By this '' untoward event," the fate of Ireland w^as de- 
cided, at a period, when, in consequence of the diminution 
of the English army from 12,000 to 5,000 disposable men, 
by the sword, by the climate, by garrison detachments, and 
by its two recent repulses at Waterford and Duncannon, 
Cromwell was in great difficulties in Munster, from the 
effects of the winter, the scarcity of provisions, and the 
approach of 5,000 foot and 500 horse, under the command 
of Major General Hugh O'Neill, the subsequent gallant 

' Hume, vol. v. p. 404, 473, 474. Cadell's edit. London, 1789. By 
the same authority it appears, that the Irish war was so expensive, that, 
in addition to the money granted by Parliament, the Queen was obliged 
to exact loans from her people, and even to adopt other expedients for 
"raising the wind," such as "selling the royal demesnes and crown 
jewels !" See, also, Lingard, (vol. v. chap, xi.jo. 599, edit. 1823,) and, 
for the other circumstances in the text, Curry's Review of the Civil 
Wars of Ireland, (chap. ix. xii.) The reason why Lord Mountjoy was 
glad to avail himself of the service of so many Irish in the English 
army, is well described in the contemporary language of the English poet 
Spencer, who both lived and wrote in Ireland. " I have heard,'' says 
he, " some great warriors say, that in all the services which they had 
seen abroad in foreign countries, they never saw a 3iore coxely 

MAX THAN THE IRISHMAN, NOR THAT COMETH ON MORE BRAVELY TO 

HIS CHARGE !" As an additional example of the deadly animosity of 
the Irish against each other, at this period, when more than half the 
English army consisted of Irishmen, it may be mentioned, that, at the 
battle of Kinsale, Lord Clanricarde, an Irish Roman Catholic nobleman, 
in the Queen's service, would let no quarter be given, and killed no less 
than 20 men with his own hand ! How long will ignorance, menda- 
city, and cowardice prate about an English " conquest of Ireland 1" 



THE GREEN BOOK. 179 

defender of Clonmel and Limerick.^ With this important 
force — disciplined and trained to victory as it had been, 
under its leader's late celebrated uncle, General Owen Roe 
O'Neill, the conqueror of Benburb^ — there was every pro- 

^ With a body of between twelve and sixteen hundred of his gallant 
northerns, Hugh O'Neill defended Clonmel for two months against 
Cromwell at the head of 20,000 men, killing between two thousand and 
two thousand five hundred of the English in one assault alone, which 
lasted, according to Lingard, no less than four hours ! The Irish general 
finally evacuated the place only from the want of powder and provisions, 
and, when he retired, withdrew his garrison so skilfully, that Cromwell, 
being unacquainted with the circumstance, gave the unarmed citizens as 
honourable terms of capitulation as if the garrison had been in the 
town. O'Neill, who, on this occasion, proved himself worthy of having 
served in the continental wars under such an experienced captain as his 
uncle, afterwards defended Limerick against Cromwell's son-in-law, 
Ireton, till he was compelled to capitulate by the machinations of a 
traitor ; and so favourable was the impression which the Irish officer's 
conduct made upon his prejudiced and bigoted enemies, that his life 
was spared, even by those sanguinary fanatics. Carte, MacG eoghegan, 
Taaffe, and Lingard. 

2 The inopportune death of the brave and accomplished Owen Roe 
O'Neill, and the equally unlucky revolt of Lord Inchiquin's army, may 
be looked upon as the two causes of the submission of Ireland to the 
English Commonwealth. General Owen Roe O'Neill had distinguished 
himself on the continent in the Imperial and Spanish services, especially 
at the siege of Arras, in 1640, which he defended against the French 
with such ability as to gain their respect, and, though eventually obliged 
to surrender, only did so on the most honourable terms. In the north 
of Ireland, this able commander had given a still further proof of his 
military talents by the defeat of Cromwell's brethren, the Scotch fana- 
tics, under Monroe, at the battle of Benburb. With inferior numbers, 
or but 5,000 infantry and 500 cavalry to 6,000 foot and 800 horse, he 
killed 3,243 of the enemy on the field of battle, besides those who fell 
in the pursuit, taking, with other prisoners. Lord Montgomery and 
twenty-one officers, all the Scotch artillery, arms, tents, baggage, and 
thirty-two stand of colours, together with an immense booty, containing 
1,500 draught horses, and provisions of every kind for two months! 
And all this was done with but a loss to the Irish of but 70 men killed 
and 200 wounded ! The Scotch general, Monroe, only saved himself 
from his victorious pursuers by a precipitate flight on horseback, leaving 
his coat, hat, and wig behind him ! If such a commander as the de- 
fender of Arras and the conqueror of Benburb had lived to measure 
sv/ords with Cromwell, it is consequently very probable, that by en- 
camping behind the English in their unsuccessful sieges of Waterford 
and Duncannon, and by thus besieging the besiegers themselves. General 
O'Neill might have either destroyed or driven back the enemy to Dublin, 
and have likewise prevented the revolt of Inchiquin's troops, which, as 
traitors know their own advantage, might not have occurred under such 



180 THE GREEN BOOK. 

bability, but for the treachery after which Cromwell was 
enabled to take the field with 20,000 men, that such use 
could have been made of a neighbouring pass to harass the 
English troops, and to straiten them still further for provi- 
sions, that they would have been compelled to retrace their 
steps towards Dublin, with considerable loss. These fa- 
vourable prospects were, however, completely blasted by 
the irreparable perfidy, which, by suddenly surrendering 
" all the considerable places in the province of Munster, as 
Cork, Youghall, Kinsale, Bandonbridge, Moyallo, and other 
garrisons under Lord Inchiquin," to the English army, 
"thereby gave them a safe retreat, free passage, and ne- 
cessary provisions of all they w^anted; as likewise harbours 
for their ships, to bring every thing to them they could 
desire. This defection, in so fatal a juncture of time, w^as," 
consequently, ''not a loss or a blow" to the Irish, but "a 
dissolution of the ivhole frame of their hopes and de- 
signs T'^ So much, in this instance too, for the idea of 
an English " conquest of Ireland," if " conquest" it can 
be called! And, as to what this ''conquest" cost, at a 

unpromising circumstances, and was subsequently the principal if not 
the entire cause of Cromwell's success. In fact, when Cromwell had 
to deal with a general of real skill, trained in the continental wars, such, 
for example, as the Scotch commander previous to the battle of Dunbar, 
who acquired his military knowledge in the same school as Owen Roe 
O'lVeill, his repubUcan Highness was only rescued from a disgraceful 
retreat into England by the contemptible fanaticism of the Scotch 
preachers, who forced their veteran commander to come down from his 
unassailable position, and thus wrenched a bloodless victory from his 
grasp. The character of General Owen Roe O'JVeill, as it is drawn by 
the learned Carte, seems to have been as well adapted for a defensive 
warfare as that of Lesley ; and there is no reason to believe that less suc- 
cess would have attended the Irish commander, who had both signally 
defeated Cromwell's fanatical brethren in the field, and was possessed of 
that military circumspection and experience, which, in Lesley's case, 
would have utterly foiled Cromwell, but for the presumptuous interfe- 
rence of spiritual folly or madness. Those O'Neills, indeed, were glo- 
rious fellows — worthy descendants of the race that held the Irish sceptre 
for 699 years ! But who would be their present honourable and titled 
namesakes, of whom it may be so aptly observed, in the language of 
Burke, that " no people will look forward, to posterity, who do not 
often look backwards to their ancestors !" If it is not true, as some 
assert, that the lasl^of this really noble race died at the battle of the 
Boyne, bow justly may we exclaim with the poet, — 

" Oh ! how unworthy of the brave and great ?" 
1 Curry, book yiii. chap. vi. Lingard, vol. yii. p. 31, 32, & 33. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 181 

period when, according to British testimony, Ireland had 
not 1,500,000 inhabitants, nor England a revenue much 
above ij2,000,000 a year, we find that the expense of the 
contest to England, and that portion of her Irish assistants 
denominated the "Protestant party," has been estimated 
by one British authority of those days at the immense sum 
of .^22, 191,258, andbyotherseven so high as ^34, 480, 000!^ 
Descending to the next Irish war, or that of the revolution 
of 1688, Voltaire's remark, that the Irish have always 
fought badly at home, and that Ireland seems made for sub- 
jection, will appear to have no more foundation in truth 
than his erroneous notions respecting an English " con- 
quest of Ireland," and even respecting the very circum- 
stances of the battle of the Boyne and the other events of 
that war from which he ventures to draw such rash and 
hasty conclusions. Indeed, through the whole of that war, 
any want of success on the part of the Irish was attributable 
rather to foreign than to native misconduct — rather to the 
faults of their leaders, or of James and St. Ruth, than to 
any deficiency of military spirit or ability in the Irish 
soldiers or officers. 

Thus, w^hen in the first campaign against the English, or 
that of 1689, Schomberg was enclosed in a cid de sac 
amongst the bogs and morasses of Dundalk, where, from the 
unhealthiness of the situation, in addition to the moisture 
of the climate, the English lost, according to some accounts, 
8,000, and, according to others, 9,000 men; when even 
their available troops, but 12, or 14,000 in number, were in 
a weak and dispirited condition ; and when it was the 
general and w^ ell-grounded opinion in the Irish army, that, 
if attacked by their force of 20,000 men, Schomberg's 
troops would be destroyed or driven to their ships — James, 
instead of ordering an assault on the English camp, con- 

' Story's Continuation of the History of the Wars of Ireland, chap. xi. 
p. 315-16. This writer, who is the best English authority for the 
transactions of the war of 1689-90, and 91, in Ireland, the whole of 
which he was present at as a chaplain to one of William's regiments, 
cites Sir John Borlase's (or, as he spells it, Burlace's) History for the 
first sum, and others, without naming them, for the second sum, in the 
text. The annual amount of the English revenue is taken from Hume, 
at its highest pitch, or under the administration of Cromwell ; and the 
number of the population of Ireland is stated in round numbers from 
Sir William Petty, who calculates the Irish people, at the time of the 
insurrection of 1641, as 1,466,000. 



182 THE GREEN BOOK. 

tented himself with a mere idle demonstration to that effect, 
and then withdrew his soldiers with a degree of indecision, 
at once so unseasonable and ruinous, that Marshal Rosen 
naturally exclaimed, ''If you possessed a hundred king- 
doms, you would lose them !"^ 

1 MacGeoghegan, vol. iii. p. 454-5. Dalrymple, vol. i. p. 436- 
441. Harris, p. 254. Story, Imp. Hist. p. 16, 17, 44, 45. King 
James's Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 372 to 384. Keatinge's Def. of Ireland, 
chap. V. p. 17, 30, 31. In this chapter of his work, Col. Keatinge has 
given an interesting military analysis of the Irish campaigns of 1689, 
1690, and 1691. James takes credit to himself for going to meet and 
for offering battle to Schomberg, with an army so harassed, dispersed, 
and enfeebled as the Irish forces were after the siege of Derry, instead 
of abandoning Dublin to the enemy, and falling back and waiting at 
Athlone and along the Hne of the Shannon for succours from France, as 
he states that he was advised to do by Marshal Rosen and several French 
officers. But, in not compelling the English to engage, with a force in 
such good spirits, and so superior in numbers, health, and strength, as 
he confesses that the Irish subsequently became, while the English, on 
the contrary, both from their own historian Story and from Schomberg's 
correspondence with William, appear to have been so enfeebled by dis- 
ease, that they could hardly have resisted a vigorous attack, supported, 
as such an attack could have been, by the explosion of a plot in Schom- 
berg's Huguenot regiments of some disguised French Catholics ; by not 
acting-, I say, as a good military judge, like Colonel Keatinge, thinks 
that a proper general ought to have acted against an enemy so circum- 
stanced, James seems to have merited the censures of those historians 
who condemn his conduct on that occasion. He thus deprived himself 
of the great advantage which his Catholic partisans in Schomberg's 
camp might have given him, by declaring themselves for him at the 
most critical period, or in the very time of action ; and, in consequence 
of the subsequent discovery and frustration of the plot by Schomberg, an 
opportunity for striking an important blow was lost that could never 
after be regained. {Harris, p. 246.) This line of argument respecting 
James is rendered still stronger by Story's admission, that it "certainly 
was not impossible to force the English camp," though entrenched, {Imp. 
Hist. p. 40.) and by the additional consideration, that though Schom- 
berg was superior in point of artillery, yet he was so inferior in cavalry 
to James, that the latter, even in case of a repulse, would have been 
completely covered or protected by his horse against any thing like a 
decisive defeat. " If we," says Story, " had gone out into the plain, and 
had our foot charged by their horse at the rate we were afterwards at 
the Boyne, I know not what might have followed." {Imp. Hist. p. 45.) 
Indeed, the principle of " nothing venture, nothing have," which is so 
peculiarly applicable in war, was, to all appearance, never more strongly 
verified than on this occasion, when Schomberg, in addition to his com- 
plaint to William, that the pikes of his men were " rotten," and their 
muskets unfit to " use at all," adds, with respect to the military qualities 
of the English, who were perishing in his camp like diseased sheep — 



THE GREEN BOOK. 183 



CHAPTER V. 



Extension of the same inquiry, in greater detail, to the Jacobite and 
Williamite war, containing a true, in opposition to the false, or British 
and Anglo-Irish statements, respecting the comparative amount of the 
Irish and English numbers, artillery, &c. at the Boyne ; and also a 
passing review and comments on the events of that campaign, includ- 
ing William's repulse at Limerick, Marlborough's capture of Cork 
and Kinsale, the subsequent defeat of Ginckle's attempted winter 
operations against Kerry and Connaught, and the great annoyance 
given to the invaders by the Irish guerillas, or Rapparees. 

As to the defeat of the Boyne, with which Voltaire con- 
nects such defamatory consequences to the Irish military 
character, that river, w^hich is often no more than three or 
four feet deep in some parts, is quite fordable in summer, 
and consequently no such wonderful natural obstacle to the 
passage of a well-disciplined enemy as Voltaire would re- 
present it to be ; especially when it is considered, that 
James, against the able advice of his general, Hamilton, the 
night before the battle, left the important pass of Slane, 
which was the key to his position, inadequately guarded, 
till it was too late to remedy such a glaring and fatal mis- 
take.' 

^'^ The English nation is so delicately bred, that^ as soon as they 
are out of their own country, they die the first campaign, in all the 
foreign countries where I have seex them serve /" With such troops, 
and in such a condition, would James have chiefly had to deal in case 
of an attack on their lazaretto camp at Dundalk ; and what would 
have been the result in such circumstances, it does not appear to be 
difficult to foretell, notwithstanding what Schomberg has likewise 
observed of the usual ridiculous self-conceit of the English "parliament 
and people, who," says he, " have a prejudice that an English new- 
raised soldier can beat above six of his enemies !" {Letters to King 
William, in Dairy mple, vol. ii. p. 178, 180 & 181.) The gallant old 
Marshal, who, at the age of 82, had ample experience of the military 
qualifications of every nation in Europe, found this vulgar dream of in- 
sular ignorance and beef-and-ale presumption to be of very little value 
in the camp of Dundalk. The soldiership that depends upon a 
butcher's stall, a brewery, and a warm bed, will do much better for a 
boxing-match than a bivouac ,- it will begin a campaign far better than 
it will end it. It is only the " boys" who can march and starve as 
well as fight that will last to the end of that trying sort of business. 
I MacGeoghegan, vol. i. p. 27. Colonel Keatinge, chap. v. p. 18, 



184 THE GREEN BOOK. 



Again, the defending army, or that of James, amounted 
to no more than 20,000 men, of which only 6,000 French 
could be counted experienced soldiers, the Irish levies be- 
ing ''newly raised, half disciplined, and half armed. "^ The 
attacking force, or that of WilUam, is stated at 36,000 vete- 
ran troops, wanting for nothing, and in the highest state of 
discipline. 2 The defending, or Irish army,"had only six 

19, 20. Harris, copying Story, says that James, having called a coun- 
cil, " Lieutenant General Hamilton advised him to send eight regiments 
towards Slane." To which James repHed, " he would send fifty dra« 
goons towards Slane, which," continues Harris, "justly amazed Hamil- 
ton, considering the importance of the place to be defended !'' James, 
indeed, partially acted upon Hamilton's advice, by subsequently sending 
Sir Neale OTSeill's dragoons and 6 guns to guard the pass. But, 
though they acted very well, they w^ere not able to maintain that post 
against the enemy, who, to the amount of above 10,000 men, attacked 
it early in the morning, and carried it by superior numbers. {Harris, 
p. 267 Sf 8. Kirig James's Memoirs, vol n.p. 395 c^ 6.) 

^ King James's Memoirs, vol. ir. p. 391 and 393. James must have 
best known the amount of his own troops at the Boyne, and, when he 
wrote, was too much influenced by religion, and weaned from the con^ 
siderations of mere worldly glory, to be the author of a deliberate false- 
hood or misrepresentation. His army, too, was deprived of a body of 
troops, said to ha- d amounted to 3 regiments of foot and 5 troops of 
horse, which, according to Story (Imp. Hist. p. 90.), were stated to 
have come from Munster to join the king, but, not arriving till the day 
after the battle, marched back again. This circumstance, and that of 
Lausun's 6,000 French being merely an exchange /or MountcasheVs 
6,000 Irish, left James's army no more than in 1689, or but cioi^f 20,000 
men— the only difference being this, that, in 1689, James had 20,000 
Irish, and, in 1690, 14,000 Irish, and about 6,000 French. {Memoirs, 
vol. II. p. 378, 387 and 388.) I neither take the number of James's army 
from an historian of William's party, nor the number of William's army 
from an historian of James's party, since, unless ivhere an author may 
be contradicted on data supplied by himself, each side has a better 
right to know the amount of its own force than its enemy has. This 
is the course observed by our modern Polybius, Napier, in his excellent 
History of the Peninsular War. The Duke of Berwick makes the Irish 
army^23,000 and William's 45,000 men. {Mem. vol. i. p. 45.) 

2 Story, Imp. Hist. p. 70. Leland takes this estimate from Story, but 
states James's forces, without consulting any Irish authority, at about 
33,000 in number ! King James, on the other hand, {Memoirs, vol. ii. 
p. 391 and 393,) makes William's army to have been above 40 000 or 
between 40 and 50,000 men ; yet not without strong apparent grounds 
for doing so, smce Story, {Cont. Hist chap. u. p. 19,^ in statino- Wil- 
liam's army at the Boyne as 36,000, adds, "though the world called us 
at least a third part more." A third, or 12,000, added to 36,000, would 
make 48,000 men, and " the world" did not entertain this opinion with- 
out a considerable semblance of probability. According to Story him- 



THE GREEN BOOK. 185 

cannon in the action. The attacking, or English force, had 
above fifty pieces of artillery. In fine, those 36,000 ve- 

self, (Contin. Hist. p. Sia,) the British regular forces in Ireland, in 
1690, consisted of 2 troops of guards, 23 regiments of horse, 5 regi- 
ments of dragoons, and 46 regiments of foot. Taking William's army 
AT the Boyne as 36,000 men complete, and comparing it with what it 
was when reviewed at Finglas after the action, it was found to contain, 
EXCLUSIVE of sergeants, officers, sick, wounded, and abse?it, a force of 
30,330 SOLDIERS. (Story, Imp. Hist. p. 97.) This would require 
the addition of about a fifth, or 5,670 men, to constitute the full com- 
plement of 36,000. Besides this army, William had 4 more regiments, 
or those of Colonels Deering, Herbert, Hambleton, and White, which 
were in garrison, and, as such, not included in any calculation deduced 
from the review at Finglas. (Stori/, Imp. Hist. p. 97.) These 4 we 
find to have been infantry, as the cavalry regiments are duly accounted 
for at the review. Counting Solmes's 3 Dutch battalions at the review 
as equivalent to 3 regiments, the average number of each foot regiment 
at Finglas was 594 men — so that, taking each of the 4 garrison or non- 
included regiments at that number, and adding about a fifth to make up 
for the deficiencies already specified at Finglas, the 4 will each contain 
705, or in all amount to about 2,820 men. But, as 38 and 4 make only 
42 out of the 46 infantry regiments which Story says were in British 
pay in Ireland in 1690, we must add 4 more regiments, or another 2,820 
men, to make up the 46. The account of William's numbers will con- 
sequently stand thus ; — 

Reviewed at Finglas, 30,330 

Addition of about a fifth, as above accounted for, . . 5,670 



Acknowledged at the Boyne, , . . . 36.000 
Four regiments, in garrison or complete, at 705 men each, 2,820 

Four regiments, not accounted for, ditto, . . . 2,820 



Grand Total ix Ireland, .... 41,640 
Deduct 4 garrison regiments, .... 2,820 



Really at the Boyne, 38,820 

But these 38,820 men were only the regulars actually in British pay, 
though it may be presumed, during a period of such bitter political and 
rehgious animosity in Ireland, that William's army would be swelled 
from the north by many Protestant irregulars or volunteers, actuated 
by sentiments of enthusiasm, revenge, or plunder. Amongst these 
were Dr. W^alker, of Derry, and those incidentally alluded to by Story 
under the name of " Scots Irish," whose courage is sufficiently obvious 
from his mentioning them as having been across the river with Schom- 
berg when he was slain, and whose keen sense of acquisitiveness ap- 
pears in the circumstance of their having, even during the action, taken 
off " most of the plunder !" {Story, Imp. Hist. p. 82.) And these 
were, no doubt, a portion of the " at least a third part more " which 

16 



186 THE GREEN BOOK. 

terans were literally led by William, one of the most inde- 
fatigable and experienced captains of his own, or, indeed, 
of any age/ 

" the world" gave William credit for, though Story, to heighten the vic- 
tory of his royal patron, might gloss over the obvious and explicit men- 
tion of any but William's regular troops. In short, from what we 
KNOW of an Orangeman's inveterate anti-nationality and brutal bigot- 
ry even at present, or when political and religious liberality is so much 
more diffused than in 1690, there can be no reasonable doubt that Wil- 
liam's army was assisted, and very effectually assisted, by a large num- 
ber of northern Protestants, who then, as now, were better armed than 
the Irish Catholics — -while James did not enjoy a parallel advantage on 
his side, since he informs us, (Memoirs, voL ii. p, 328, 391,) that even 
the 20,000 men who composed his regular army were but "half-armed," 
and thei/ were all that he could arm, even to that extent, out of 100,000 
men, who originally declared fur him in less than one month, but had 
to be dismissed for want of adequate supplies of arms and money from 
France. (Mem. ap. Macpherson'' s Orig. Pap. vol. i.p. 176, 183, &c.) 
William, too, according to the information made use of by James, 
"drew out his troops from Belturbet, Inniskilling, and all the other 
parts of the country, leaving few men in any of his garrisons." 
(Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 392.) So that, though some regiments of the 
number mentioned by Story as being in British pay in Ireland in 1690 
may have been included amongst those that were in Ireland only /or a 
time, and were afterwards sent to England, as some luere by William, 
(Harris, p. 282 ;) and though James may have erroneously thought that 
William had less than 4 regiments in garrison ; and consequently so 
much the greater number of men on the field of battle ; yet it has been 
seen, that " the world" and James were not without many circumstances 
to strengthen the idea, that William's army really was " between 40 and 
50,000 men," or, in Story's words, ^' at least a third part more" than 
36,000 men. In fact, as the troops ordered from Ireland to England by 
William were not sent away till about July 27th, or some weeks after 
the battle of the Boyne, James, in his situation, had no reason to doubt 
the substantial or average correctness of his numerical estimate of the 
English army. Thus, Jameses account of the number of William^s 
army is more worthy of credit than the accounts of William'' s writers 
with respect to the number of James'' s army ! 

' MacGeoghegan, who tells us, (vol. in. p. 447,) that he compiled 
his account of the Irish war from •' several memoirs of credit," says that 
the artiller}^ of James, at the battle, "consisted of but 12 field-pieces 
that were brought from France. ( Vol, iir. p. 457.) James, however, 
who is related by Story (hap. Hist. p. 77, 78, 81) to have sent a-way 
MOST of his CANNON, with part of his baggage, towards Dublin, the 
night before the engagement — a statement confirmed by the royal Me- 
moirs, except in the unimportant circumstance of the actual removal 
not having commenced till the morning just as the battle began — James, 
I say, reduces the number of cannon which he had in the field to half 
the number stated by the Abbe, or to but six pieces ! (Memoirs^ vol, ii. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 187 

On the other hand, if, in addition to the great inferiority 
of James's force in numbers, discipline, equipments, and 
artillery, it be true, according to Chabrias, the Athenian 

JO. 395, 396.) "The King," say the Memoirs, after mentioning the 
commencement of the action by the advance of the English right wing 
towards Slane, and his command to the Irish left to march and oppose 
the enemy, — "the King ordered . . . .the baggage towards Dublin 
vjith ALL the CAXNOX but six -which were directed to follow the left 
wing.'* (Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 396.) Thus, by this additional specimen 
of fantastical generalship on the part of their -royal leader, the Irish, as 
if they did not already labour under sufficient disadvantages, were de- 
prived of " most of their cannon !" — a disadvantage, the extent of which 
may be sufficiently conceived, even without reading Story's account 
(hup. Hist. p. 79) of the use made by William's army of their guns 
against the Irish left and centre ! Indeed, as William was obliged to 
enter the river so early as a quarter after 10 o'clock to attack the Irish 
centre at Old-Bridge, since, if he "deferred it an hour longer," says 
Story, "then the tide, which generally comes up above Old-Bridge, would 
certainly have prevented our men from passing either there or be- 
low : so that the right wing of our army had been exposed to the 
hazard of fighting all theirs, and the rest not able to come to their 
relief, till possibly it had been too late !" — as this was the case, it is 
plain, that it was by leaving this important position entirely without de- 
fence, though exposed to a heavy fire of artillery, that the passage was 
effected. (Story, Contin. Hist. p. 24, and Imp. Hist. p. 79, 80, 81.) 
Hence it appears, that by not sending off " most of the cannon" to 
Dublin, but by keeping it where it was really wanted, and by properly 
guarding the pass of Slane, James might have arrested WiUiam at the 
Boyne on the 1st of July, and that afterwards, from the reinforcements 
which would have joined the Irish army, and the news from England 
and the Continent, subsequently specitied, William would have been 
still less enabled to cross the Boyne ; if he would not have been obliged, 
before he could effect any thing, to quit Ireland in person with part of 
his forces, which, even after his victory, it was requisite to send to Eng- 
land. In fact, in depriving the Irish of the greater part of their artillery 
at such a juncture, one would think that James was trying whether Irish 
courage could not gain a battle even under circumstances that no other 
soldiers could be expected to win one; one would imagine that he 
meant to imitate those dog-fighters who break or cut off the fore-paws of 
their dogs to prove, that even when thus treated, the unfortunate ani- 
mals can still " show fight." As to the number of William's guns, re- 
specting which all the writers of his party that I have seen are most 
unsatisfactorily or suspiciously silent, James, in such circumstances, 
must be our only authority on the subject. In mentioning the cannon- 
ading of his camp by the enemy, the day before the battle, the king says 
of the English cannon, that " they were very numerous, being at least 
50 pieces, (as was sayd,) with severall small mortars, which they fired 
also," (Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 391 anc? 395 ;) and this is elsewhere sub- 
stantially confirmed by two different statements of the royal author. In 



188 THE GREEN BOOK. 

general, that ** an army of stags, led by a lion, would be 
better than an army of lions, led by a stag," what a great 
disadvantage and discouragement the Irish suffered, in being 
under such an unfortunate imbecile, nay such an absolute 
runaway, as James ! Yet, after a brave struggle, which, in 
one period of the action, might have been fatal to a force 
not commanded by such able and gallant officers as Wil- 
liam's were, the Irish army rallied, restored their order, 
cannonaded their pursuers, retreated in such style as elicited 
their enemy's commendation, and, in a word, only aban- 
doned the contest, feeling or exclaiming, in the spirit of 
Chabrias's maxim, '' Exchange kings, and we'll fight the 
battle over again !"^ The loss of William — including the 
famous Marshal Schomberg, the gallant Caillemotte, com- 
mander of the French Protestants, and Walker, the brave 

the first of these we are told, that according to Dean, an officer of Mar- 
shal Schomberg's ordnance, who deserted to the king in 1689, the Mar- 
shal's artillery consisted of 20 pieces and 6 mortars; and, in the second, 
we are informed, that the train which William himself brought over to 
Ireland in his fleet, the following year, amounted to " 30 pieces of great 
cannon." {Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 374 and 391.) Thus, exclusive of 
the mortars, " which they fired also," we have at the Boyne, between 
Schomberg's and William's train, 50 pieces of artillery— 30 of these 
being particularly noted for their large size. The complete silence as to 
the amount of W^illiam's guns by the writers of his party has rendered 
this attempt of mine necessary, in order to ascertain the comparative 
strength of his and James's army in point of artillery. MacGeoghegan 
{vol. III. p. 456) makes William's army to have "had with them 60 
pieces of heavy cannon;" so that the statement in the text of "above 
50 pieces of artillery," is so amply justified as to appear considerably 
under rather than over the truth. 

As to the number of cannon that James might have had at the Boyne, 
if he had not sent away all but 6 pieces to Dublin, it appears from the 
agreement of MacGeoghegan, {vol. in. p. 457,) as cited at the com- 
mencement of this note, and the interesting " Journal of what passed 
in Ireland,'' to be found amongst Nairne's Papers, {ap. Macpherson^ 
Orig. Pap. vol. i. p. 180,) that the Irish artillery, before the battle, con- 
sisted of 12 field pieces; and the "excellent field-train" which, accord- 
ing to Story, {Imp. Hist. p. 136,) was brought by J^ausun's troops "in 
the spring out of France," and " which they took along with them when 
they returned,'' is mentioned, upon the information of Mr. Payne, a Pro- 
testant merchant of Dublin, who escaped from that city to Schomberg 
and was by him sent to William, to have amounted to "about 20 field 
pieces." {Rawdon Papers, p. 316.) Thus James, with his own 12 
and Lausun's 20 pieces, might have had 32 instead of only 6 guns in 
action at the Boyne ! 

1 Dalrymple, vol. i. p. 495-96-98. Leland, vol. in. p. 668. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 189 

defender of Derry— was 500 men ; and James's — with the 
exception of the capture of Lieutenant General Hamilton, 
including no personage at all approaching to the military 
celebrity of the two officers of William — amounted to no 
more than 1,000 men, two or three standards, and one can- 
non : a very trifling loss, indeed, on the side of the Irish, 
when the very great inferiority of their royal leader^ their 
numbers, their discipline, and their artillery, is duly con- 
sidered.' 



' With the exception of a want of steadiness in some newly-raised 
infantry in the centre at Old-Bridge, {Imp. Hist. p. 79, 80,) and the 
conduct of Lord Dungan's and two regiments of Clare dragoons in the 
same part of the action, {Jcunes's Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 399, and 31ac' 
Geoghegan, vol. in. p. 457,) the Irish army, but especially the cavalry, 
behaved very well in the engagement; a fact sufficiently evinced by the 
continuance of the battle, under so many disadvantages to the Irish, 
from 6 in the morning until night — and this in July ! (Imp. Hist, p, 
78, 85, Sf Mcic Geoghegan, vol. iii. p. 458.) The small share which 
the English had in the conflict and other circumstances connected with 
it are well set forth by Story. "As to our English forces," says he, 
" there were few of them that had an opportunity at this place to show 
themselves, but those that had acquitted themselves very well ; the 
French and Innisldlliners did good service ; and, to give the Dutch 
Guards their due, they deserve immortal honour for what they did that 
day. T inquired of several who they were that managed the retreat the 
Irish viade that day so much to their advantage, for (not to say 
worse of them than they deserve) it was in good order as far as ave 
COULD SEE them, (I mean with the horse and French foot,) whatsoever 
they did afterwards; but I could hear of none in particular; .... but 
this is certain, that the French were towards the left of their army that 
day, and so did little or so service, except it was in the retreat ; 
whereas if they had posted them, instead of the Irish foot, at the pass 
[i. e. of Old-Bridge] we had found warmer work of it. But Providence 
orders all things, and amongst those the counsels of the greatest." {Imp. 
Hist. p. 89.) The loss of William in killed is stated by his clerical 
historian to have been so incredibly low as only " nigh 400 !" Now, in 
the passage of a river in the face of a hostile force that behaved as the 
Irish did, or in other words, after an engagement which, under such 
circumstances, commenced so early, and continued till so late in a long 
summer's day, it is surely very improbable that William's slain were so 
few ! In truth, as we read of no considerable detachment made from 
W^illiam's army at the battle, but one of 1,300 men against Drogheda, 
(Imp. Hist. p. 89,) even if we make the most ample allowances on the 
score of wounded, absent, officers, &c., we can hardly suppose that an 
army of 36,000 men complete, on the 1st of July, could, by nothing 
more than a quiet summer march from the Boyne to Dublin, be reduced 
on the 5th, at Finglas, to but 30,330 effiBctive soldiers, unless the loss of 
that army was more than " nigh 400 !" Harris, {p. 270,) in prefer- 

16* 



190 THE GREEN BOOK. 

After this action, part of the seven French battalions 
whom Lausun had recently brought to Ireland in the place 
of six Irish battalions, forming the brigade of Mountcashel, 
who had been transferred in exchange to France, proceeded 
to Kinsale, where they embarked for France ; and the re- 
mainder of the French, under Lausun, marched to Galway 
for the same purpose — thus injuring Ireland more than 

ring to state William's killed as " about 500," while he at the same 
time observes, that ^^ others say much fewer," is decidedly more credible 
in the authorities which he follows. The loss of James's army — esti- 
mated by Story at " between 1,000 and 1,500 men," and mentioned by 
Harris to have been " generally computed at 1,500 men, though some," 
he adds, " reckon it not to exceed half that number" — has been stated 
by the Duke of Berwick, a leader in the Irish army, at about 1,000 
men. (^Memoires, vol, i. p. 49.) The principal personages killed on 
James's side were Lords Dungan and Carlingford, the Marquis d'Hoc- 
quincourt, and Sir Neale O'A'eill. (Harris, p. 270.) One of the 
colours lost by the Irish was captured by the Dutch Blue Guards, in 
the centre, [Harris, p. 268,) and the remainder, vaguely stated as " one 
or two" standards, by Schomberg's French horse, in the left wing. 
(Imp. Hist. p. 83.) The single cannon left behind by the Irish, was 
1 oat of the 6, which James did not send away before the battle to 
Dublin, but despatched with Sir Neale O'Neill towards Slane, where it 
was only abandoned, notwithstanding the superior force of the enemy, 
and the obstacles which the ground presented to the carriage of heavy 
guns, on account of its being " bogged." But the other 5 pieces were 
honourably brought off. (King James's Memoirs, vol. it. p. 396-7, 401, 
Sf Story, Imp, Hist. p. 79.) The Duke of Berwick, who describes 
James's troops as charging and recharging the superior number of the 
enemy's army ten several times after it had passed the river, and as 
making such an impression by this gallant conduct, as to occasion a halt, 
while they reformed their lines, and retreated at slow step towards Du- 
leek, speaks in these honourable terms of the Irish retreat, after mention- 
ing the passage of the rivulet, or Nanny Water, by the Irish cavalry ; — 
" Nous nous ralliames," says he, " de I'autre cote, et toide notre armee 
s'y rangea en bataiUe, Les ennemis en firent autant vis-ii-vis de nous, 
mais n'oserent nous attaquer. x'^prcs quelque pen de temps, nous nous 
remimes en marche, et fumes suivis par partie de I'armee ennemie; 
toutes les fois quW quelque defile nous faisions halte, its en faisoient 
de meme, et je crois qyCils ctoient Men aises de xocs faihe ux font 
d'or !" (Mem. vol. i. p. 49.) Altogether, with the great deficiency in 
point of numbers, discipline, equipments, artillery, and generalship, 
against which the Irish had to contend at the Boyne, their conduct 
there was any thing but discreditable to the military character of their 
country: and, as for Voltaire's inferring any superiority of the English 
over the Irish, as soldiers, from the result of that battle, the inference is 
as unjustifiable as it is superficial, since, even according to Story him- 
self, the honour of the victory is due to the foreign mercenaries and 
northern liiisa troops in William's service, and jtot to the English* 



THE GREEN BOOK. 191 

they served her, by retaining her troops on the Continent 
and loithdrawing theirs from Ireland^ — while James, in 
his flight, equally contributed to deprive the nation who 
fought for him of any benefit from their French alliance. 

Before the engagement at the Boyne, he had been advised, 
on a consideration of the general superiority of William's 
force, that it would be better to allow them the temporary 
advantage of entering Dublin f that the Irish should, mean- 
time, fall back upon the strong line of the Shannon ;^ 

* MacGeoghegan, vol. iii. p. 456-58-59. The Duke of Berwick's 
censure of Lausun, for not attacking the English on the Slane side at 
the battle of the Boyne, may, perhaps, be excused or palliated by the 
delay which a considerable curve in the river, and other matters, would 
occasion to the march of a body of troops from the Irish main army 
towards Slane. But no disgrace could be too great for that French 
officer's conduct in writing over to France a most discouraging and in- 
jurious account of the affairs of Ireland ; in demanding ships for the 
desertion of the country he was sent to defend ; in remaining idle, near 
Galway, with about 3,000 men, during William's attack on Limerick; 
and in then causing, by his departure, the capture of Cork and Kinsale 
by Marlborough, owing to the consequent want of a sufficient force, on 
the Duke of Berwick's part, to attempt the relief of those important sea- 
ports. On his return to France, Lausun, instead of merely losing his 
reputation at court, should have had his head taken off' his shoulders. 
{Berwick, Mem, vol. i. p. 55 Sf 56. Harris, p. 283 c^ 302.) 

2 James informs us that Jiis motive for preferring to fight at the Boyne 
was the great superiority, in public estimation, which the enemy would 
acquire by getting possession of the Irish capital. Considered merely 
in itself, this notion was, in reality, a just one. As regards a hostile 
invasion from England, scarcely any metropolis can be worse situated 
for safety against the attack of such a neighbouring state than Dublin is. 
Were Ireland an independent nation, her capital should be about the 
centre of the island, or in that part of the country which could be easiest 
assisted from every side, and would be farthest away from the frontier 
in all directions. Proper batteries on all the confmanding points of the 
numerous islands on the Shannon would sufficiently guard against any 
such catastrophe as the ascent to and capture of Washington by 
water ; and, by land, the farther an invader would advance into the 
country towards an inland metropolis, the weaker he would be, and the 
stronger his opponents ! In case of such a revolution in Ireland — a 
revolution which might, in fact, have occurred, were James a man of 
spirit and well supported by France — Dublin should become with re- 
spect to a new metropolis what Rome did to Constantinople and Mos- 
cow to Petersburgh. But, in the present political situation of Ireland 
with regard to its neighbour, the position of our capital to England is 
quite natural. The handle of the tankard should be as convenient as 
possible to the grasp of him who wishes to draix it, 

3 "The great object in the map of Ireland," says Colonel Keatinge, 



192 THE GREEN BOOK. 

strengthen their garrisons ; draw William away from hig 
ships, on which he relied for ammunition and provisions ; 
and wait for the result of the French military operations 
against the Allies in Flanders, and the approaching fulfil- 
ment of Louis's promise, — whose fleet had beaten the 
English, the year before, in Bantry Bay, — that he would 
send a large naval armament into the English Channel, and 
a squadron of frigates and privateers to the Irish coasts to 
burn all William's transports ! From the superiority of 
the French at sea, this last undertaking appeared easy and 
certain. William would have been consequently shut up 
in a hostile island, till a new fleet of transports could be 
prepared in England — if his army would not be even 
ruined, in the interval, by the burning or capture of his 
stores of bread and ammunition, that, says Harris, ''sailed 
along the coast as he advanced, without a safe port to 
COVER AND SECURE THEM ;" and, during the absence of the 
English forces in Ireland, Britain, unprotected against a 
foreign invasion from an enemy, superior at sea, and sup- 
ported by the exertions of the Stuart party, would, in all proba- 
bility, be lost to William 1^ On his arrival in Dublin from the 
Boyne, James, according to Macpherson, received letters con- 
taining an account of the defeat of the Allies, with a loss of 
above 7,000 men, at Fleurus, and, about the same time, 
news arrived in Ireland of the naval victory of the French 
over the combined fleets of England and Holland, that 
were beaten into the Thames, with a loss of 8 ships of the 
line, besides others rendered unfit for service.^ Yet, 
though aware of the paramount importance of destroying 
William's transports, James, on meeting, on his passage 
from Ireland, with the Marquis de Seignelay's frigates 
coming to destroy William's unprotected shipping on the 
Irish coasts, actually made the French armament return, 
merely to escort hiinselfhdick to France I — thus abandoning 
Ireland to her invader, by depriving her of the most eflec- 

"is the Shannon. This great chain of lakes cuts off an entire province 
from the rest of Ireland, and may be classed with the Elbe, and almost 
with the Rhine, whose banks furnish so many important events in the 
mihtary history of Europe." (chap. i. p. 4.) 

1 Tindal's Rapin, vol. in. p. 90. Dalrymple, vol. i. p. 488-9. 

2 Tindal's Rapin, vol. in. p. 93, 103-4. Macpherson, vol. i. p. 
592, 594, 595, 600, 602. Of this naval action, a Dutch writer keenly 
and truly said, that "the French gained the victory, the Dutch the 
honour, and the English — the shame !" {Harrls^p, 276.) 



THE GREEN BOOK. 193 

tual succour she could have received, and at the same time 
freeing him from the danger of which he was most justly 
apprehensive.^ On this crowning act of injustice towards 
her, Ireland might well exclaim, '' Lord protect me from 
my friends, and I'll protect myself from my enemies P^ 
And thus much for this unhappy being with whom no 
nation that was connected could prosper, though Voltaire 
so unfairly ventures to disparage the military character of 
the Irish nation, in particular, from the bad success of their 
affairs in connexion with that miserable legitimate — as if it 
could be expected that better fortune could have attended 
the Irish under such unlucky auspices, than would have 
attended any other nation under the rule of the same 
wretched specimen of enmity to his friends, and friendship 
to his enemies ! 

With respect to the first siege of Athlone, upon which, 
and the line of the Shannon, the Irish army fell back after 
the defeat of the Boyne, that town was successfully de- 
fended, during a siege of seven days, by the gallant old 
gov^ernor. Colonel Grace, against General Douglas's force 
of 10 regiments of infantry, and 5 of cavalry, amounting, 
when complete, to 8,794 men, with a train of 12 cannon 
and 2 mortars, and the baffled besiegers, after a loss of 330 
men, compelled to content themselves with a renewal of 
such glory in their retreat, as they had already earned in 
their advance through the country, by a career of indis- 
criminate ravaging, plunder, perfidy, and murder.^ 

1 Story, Cont. Hist. p. 25. Dalrymple, vol. i. p. 489, 497. This 
curious and important circumstance — to say nothing of many others — 
is not noticed in any of our feeble and imperfect compilations, entitled 
^'Histories of Ireland." But such a work — to commence from the 
English invasion — would, if properly written, be a second '''Common 
Sense,'" with regard to certain sisterly usurpations, and their East and 
West British upholders. It should be the work, not merely of learning 
and patriotism, but of honesty, independence, and courage — of one 
equally determined to think out, to speak out, to write out, and, if neces- 
sary, to act out. 

" Self-contradiction is the only wrong ! 
For, by the laws of spirit, in the right 
Is every individual's character 
That acts in strict consistence with itself." 

Schiller's Wallensteln. 

2 For the barbarous, faithless, and cruel conduct of Douglas's army, 
in its march to and from iVthlone, see Macpherson and Leland, in Curry, 



194 THE GREEN BOOK. 

The success of William himself, though he had occupied 
Dublin, Drogheda,^ Wexford, Waterford, and Duncannon 

book X. chap. 19. The amount of Douglas's force is estimated from 
the calculation given before, {note 2, p, 184;) and the number and de- 
scription of that general's regiments, being 10 of foot, 3 of horse, and 2 
of dragoons, are taken from Story, Imp. Hist. p. 99. The Irish garrison 
of Athlone, who, before the raising of the siege, were "but 800 men," 
according to a despatch from Douglas himself, recited in a letter of July 
24th, 1690, from William's camp at Carrick-on-Suir, {Rawdoa Papers, 
p. 327 6f 9,) become, in Story's narrative, after the siege, no less than 
3 regiments of foot, 9 troops of dragoons, and 2 of horse, making, by the 
scale of numbers in James's regiments, (deduced from a comparison and 
correction of Story, Imp. Hist, p. 98, with Conf. Hist, p, 31,) a force 
of 2,986 men; and even " more," it is added, that "lay encamped not 
far off!" (Imp, Hist. p. 97, 98, 4" 103.) An Irish reader will judge 
whether this great difference between these two English estimates of the 
Irish garrison can be most reasonably accounted for by the supposition 
of Douglas's having at first received erroneous information ; or by a 
reinforcement having actually arrived, and raised the garrison from its 
original complement of " but 800 men ;" or, lastly, by the existence of a 
prudent necessity on the part of an English official writer and Parson, 
like Story, to varnish over the repulse of Douglas, after its occurrence, 
by adding considerably to the numbers of that officer's Irish enemies. 
In fact, even without dwelUng on the great instance of carelessness or 
suppression, upon Story's part, that has been before demonstrated, {note 
2, p, 184,) may not almost any partiality be suspected of a writer, 
who, in stating the English loss in this Athlone rfffair at 330 men, 
affirms that but 30 of these were killed before the place, (i. e. after a 
week^s firing !) and the remaining 300 by what he styles "sickness and 
other accidents 1" {Co?it. Hist. p. S2.) An army, forsooth, marches 
from Dublin to x\thlone; the time, July, is the very finest in the year; 
the people are submissive; the troops take care that t/iey shall not want 
subsistence; the march, beginning on the 9th and ending on the 17th, 
both inclusive, lasts 9 days, being no more than something between 5 
and 6 miles a day, taking Athlone as 50 miles from Dublin, according 
to the writer's own statement, or if 59 miles, on Seward's better author- 
ity, {Typ. Hit, art. Athlone,) only between 6 and 7 miles daily; the 
hostile operations between this army and the garrison of Athlone, who 
successfully defend themselves, continue briskly from July 18th to the 
24th, or for 7 days; and then the historian of this unsuccessful army, 
after making its loss no more than 300 men, coolly tells us, that but 30 
of these, or little more than 3 per day, were destroyed by their enemies 
during a week's hostilities — the surplus 300 dying by such likely causes 
of destruction as the " sickness and other accidents" that could happen 
under such circumstances as those of the expedition, previous to the 
attack upon the town ! {Story, Imp. Hist. p. 99-104, a?id Cont. Hist, 
p. 31 Sf 2.) This may pass for English but most certainly not for Irish 
history ! The total loss of Douglas when he finally joined William 
near Limerick is stated at 400 men. {Imp. Hist. p. 104.) 

I With the usual bullying and brutal insolence of the representatives 



THE GREEN BOOK. 195 

Fort,^ and was joined by Douglas, was no better against 
Limerick, than that of Douglas against Athlone. Before a 
'town, on viewing whose weak fortifications one of the 
French generals exclaimed, with an oath, that it "anight 
be taken with roast apples /" the English, with a regular 
force, stated at 20,000,^ but probably at least 25,000 men, 
were resisted by a garrison, of which only 10,000 out of 
20,000 were properly armed. William's artillery of 6 
twenty-four pounders and 2 eighteen pounders, with his tin 

of English tyranny in Ireland, the governor of Drogheda, who was in 
arms for his legitimate sovereign, or the king acknowledged by the Irish 
parliament, was summoned by the invader to surrender that town before 
the English battering train arrived, or to expect that usual specimen of 
English mercy in Ireland, called "xo auARXER !" — {Story, Imp. Hist, 
p. 89.) How the Irish garrison fared, when they did surrender, is as 
follows. **When Drogheda'' — says the honest Protestant clergyman 
Lesley, whose answer to Archbishop King's Musgrave libel of that day, 
" The State of the Protestants of Ireland under King James's Govern- 
raentj'' was suppressed by authority, because it never was, nor could be, 
really answered, — " When Drogheda surrendered to King William, after 
the defeat of the Boyne, the sick and wounded soldiers icere^ by the 
capitulations, to he talcen care of, and to be sent with passes to their 
own army, as they recovered, but they were not only j^eglected, and 
might have starved hut for the charity of some of their own poor 
countrymen, who sold their beds and clothes to relieve them, but they 
were also kept as prisoners cfter they recovered, contrary to the arti- 
cles.^'' See Curry, book x. chap. 1, 2, & 19. 

' Dalrymple, vol. i. p. 501. 

2 Harris, p. 285. The following deductions from William's regular 
army — calculated by Story as 36,000 complete at the Boyne, but already 
proved to have been 38,820 men — may serve to show the closest probable 
estimate of the English besieging force at Limerick, stated by Harris, 
and, after him, by Leland, at but 20,000 men. 

Men. 
Loss at the Boyne, ..... 500 

Party sent to besiege Drogheda, . . . . 1,300 

Left at Dublin, under Trelawny, 5 regiments of foot, (705 each,) 

andlof horse, (286 ditto,) . . . .3,811 

Deduction from Douglas's force of Colonel Babington's, Tiffin's, 
and St. John's foot, with Colonel Woolsley's large horse regi- 
ment, stated at 423 strong (Imp. Hist. p. 95) — making, with 
the 400 men lost in the expedition to and from Athlone, 2,938 

Waterford, garrison not particularized, but allowing the same as 

James's, or 2 regiments, ..... 1,410 
Wexford, Kilkenny, Duncannon Fort, Youghal, and Clonmel, 

altogether, say 4 regiments, or . . . . 2,820 

Total, . . . 12,779 



196 THE GREEN BOOK. 

or copper boats for laying a bridge over the Shannon, and 
a considerable supply of powder and provisions, were sur- 
prised, intercepted, and blown up at Ballynedy, but 7 miles 
from the English camp, by from 500 to 800 Irish cavalry 
from Limerick under Colonel Sarsfield, who, killing 60 of 
the convoy on the spot, completely dispersing the rest, 
making a considerable booty of horses, and eluding 3 dif- 
ferent bodies of cavalry sent after him, got back, with the 
loss of but 16 stragglers, in safety to Limerick! And, 
when this loss was so far remedied by the fire, for several 
days, of 36 pieces of cannon and 4 mortars, that a breach 
was made 12 yards or 36 feet wide — when a general as- 
sault was ordered with an attacking force of from 10 to 
12,000 men, with a due reserve of cavalry from the main 
army, all animated to the very highest pitch by fighting 
under the royal eye, and by the national emulation excited 
between the English, Dutch, Danes, Brandenburghers, and 
French and Irish protestants — ^vhen the town was actually 
entered — after a desperate contest of above 3 hours and a 
half — during which the unceasing thunder of the cannon 
and the roar of musketry is described by one who was pre- 
sent as so terrific, that one might suppose the skies were 

William's regular army at the Boyne, . . 38,820 

German and Swiss deserters from Lausun, . . . 300 



39,120 
Deduct as not present at Limerick, . . . 12,779 



English "regular" FORCE AT LIMERICK, . . 26,341 

For the party sent against Drogheda, all of whom, to avoid too great 
minuteness of calculation, are allowed to have remained there, though 
Brigadier La Melloniere and Colonel Cutts and his men, who "took 
possession of the place," are afterw^ards mentioned as taking part in the 
siege of Limerick — for the detachments from Douglas's army, not at Lime- 
rick — for the force at Dublin, a draft from which sent to England at the 
end of July, after the capture of Waterford, Wexford, &c. subsequently 
mentioned, appears to have been filled up by the embodying and arming 
of the Dublin militia, &c. — for the amount of James's garrison at Water- 
ford — for Wexford, in which James left only 1 and in Youghal only 3 
companies of foot, and in which William would probably not have more 
than twice those amounts of men — for Clonmel and Kilkenny, which, 
as having been at once evacuated, seem to have been thought indefen- 
sible — and for Duncannon Fort, which, though strong, was small, and 
consequently did not require a large gamson, see Story, {Imp. Hist p. 
98-111,) and Harris, (p, 278-285.) 



THE GREEN BOOK. 197 

rending asunder, and " the smoke that came from the town 
reached in one continued cloud to the top of a mountain at 
least 6 miles oiFl" — the besiegers were gallantly repulsed 
to their trenches, with a loss not amounting to 400 men on 
the part of the victorious Irish, while on that of William 
there were about 2,000 soldiers and 158 officers, killed and 
wounded ! The king, in fine, after asking the garrison for, 
and being "haughtily refused," a truce to bury his dead, 
was forced to abandon the siege. ^ 

^ King James, vol. ir. p. 415-16. Berwick, vol. i. p. 50, 51 & 53. 
Story, Imp. Hist. p. 119, 20, 21, 28, 29, 30, 31, & 32, & Cont. Hist. 
plate, p. 38. Rawdon Papers, p. 331 & 32. MacGeoghegan, vol. in. 
p. 459 & 60. Leiand, vol. in. p. 582. The loss of the Irish, on this 
occasion, is given from the Duke of Berwick, {vol. i.p. 51,) who, from 
his situation in Limerick during the siege, would be well informed on 
the subject ; and the loss of William, on account of the avowedly in- 
complete information of Story on that delicate point, and the glaring 
error of Harris's statement, (p. 288,) which makes the loss of the invader, 
even during the entire siege, to have been only " between 1000 and 1,200 
men," may be moderately computed from other English sources as fol- 
lows ; — 

Men. 
By the " List of Slain and Wounded in the Attack made on 
Limerick, on the Wth (it should be the 27th) of August, 1690, 
transmitted by the Secretary at War to the Earl of Notting- 
ham, and given in Harris, Appendix 51, there were killed or 
disabled,without saying any thing of the Brandenburghers, 158 
officers and 1531 soldiers, making altogether, . . . 1,689 
Brandenburghers, mentioned by Story {Irnp. Hist. p. 96 & 129) 
and the Rawdon Papers, (;;. 337,) of whom nearly two-thirds 
of a regiment, containing 631 soldiers after the battle of the 
Boyne, are spoken of as having been blown into the air, during 
the attack, by the explosion of the Irish powder-magazine at 
the Black Battery, 400 



Supposed total of William's loss from English evidence, 2,089 

This sufficiently justifies the habitually cautious veracity of King James's 
assertions, who makes William's loss, in killed and wounded, at this 
attack, to have been "g/ least'^ 2,000 men, {Mem. vol. ii.p. 418 ;) though 
the Duke of Berwick estimates the slain alone at 2,000. {.Mem. vol. i. 
p. 51.) Nor is the Duke's statement without very strong appearances 
of probability. In advancing against the Irish Town, or that half of 
Limerick, which (except through the minor or more remote and indirect 
operation of William's bombs and artillery) was the main object of the 
king's attack, his troops were directly flanked by the King's Island in 
the Shannon, upon which the other and more distant half of Limerick, 
called the English Town, lay. That portion' of the King's Island, not 
covered by the buildings of the English Town, was fenced with a pro- 

17 



198 THE GREExV BOOK. 

Ill this celebrated repulse of William at Limerick, two 
circumstances occurred, that reflect a halo of the purest and 

tecting line of works opposite, in a flanking direction, to the site of 
William's operations at the other side of the Shannon; and, besides 
these protecting works, the island was strengthened by a body of Irish 
troops and a newly-raised fort. (See Story^s plate, Cont. Hist. p. 38.) 
During the attack upon the breach, the gallant Brigadier Talbot, making 
a dashing sally upon the besiegers with 500 men from a horn-work where 
he was stationed, ran round the wall at the outside, charging the enemy's 
rear, and getting back again into the breach ! {Berwick, vol. i.p. 50.) 
In addition to this circumstance, " the Irish," says Story, " had 2 small 
field-pieces planted in the King^s Island, which flankt their own coun- 
terscarp, and in our attack did us no small damage, as did also 2 guns 
more that they had planted within the town, opposite to the breach and 
charged with cartridge-shot." (Imp. Hist. p. 130.) Hence, with nearly 
3 hours pelting of every sort of missile which the besiegers received from 
the counterscarp, (of which pelting more anon) — with Brigadier Talbot's 
smashing sally upon their rear from the horn-work — with 2 pieces of 
cannon helping them through the breach to plenty of cartridge-shot in 
their van — and with 2 more pieces from the island tearing away at their 
right flank — with all these obstacles, even the ^^ British heart and the 
British arm" must have been cut up in such sweeping style, that, if the 
Irish gunners were not very ignorant of their business, the Duke of 
Berwick's estimate of William's slain alone at 2,000 does not appear 
unreasonable ; especially when all these circumstances are associated 
with the already-demonstrated incompleteness of Story and the above- 
quoted official return upon the subject. The statement in the text will 
consequently not appear exaggerated. This success of the Irish, it should 
be observed, was the more creditable to them, since it was obtained in 
spite of the most shameless desertion and opposition on the part of their 
French allies, and, what is not improbable, though hitherto not com- 
mented upon by any historian, with something too like positive treachery 
on the part of those allies. "For," says King James, ''as soon as the 
enemy had appeared before Limerick, the French Generall with all 
his troops marched str eight to Galway, takeing with him a great quan- 
tety of amimition, 6lc. ; so that, instead of assistance during the siege, 
the Irish ivere lueakend hy them in their stores, which might have been 
necessary for their defence /" Then, after mentioning that Lausun 
indeed gave back what he had taken, though not until " after the siege 
luas raised," James very properly remarks, " that this piece of conduct 
in abandoning a country they were sent to succour, and which it was so 
much the in tr est of France to support at so critical a juncture, ivhen 
the last stake was engaged, and the Irish resolved to make a vigorous 
defence, was such a paredox as could scarce be fathomed !" — after 
which he adds, that "some discontented persons sayd that Monsieur 
Lausune and the French being excessive weary of the country, had a 
mind Limerick should be taken, to excuse their leaveingit, that therefore 
they cared not how things went, nor what disorder they commited ;" and, 
finally, "that Boislau (i. e. Boisseleau, the French governor at Limerick,) 
dureing the assault, ordered several battalions from the breach, which, 



THE GREEN BOOK. 199 

noblest glory upon the name of Ireland in general, and of 
Limerick in particular. After driving the English from the 

had he been obey d In, the towx had been lost !" {Mem. vol. ii. 
p. 420 & 21.) These assertions of what are called " discontented per- 
sons" are, moreover, curiously enough countenanced by a very signifi- 
cant passage in the postscript of a private letter written to Sir Arthur 
Rawdon from William's camp before Limerick, August 29, IG90, or but 
two days after the king's defeat. After having said, " we never have 
received such a foil !" the writer adds, " we got their countersign — got 
into the breach — but were beaten back.'^ {Rawdon Papers, p. 337 & 
38.) And this English letter is countenanced, if not positively confirmed, 
in its statement, by the following extract from the Duke of Berwick, 
which admits that the breach was surprised, under circumstances con- 
nected with its weak condition and immediate vicinity to the enemy, that 
can only be rationally accounted for by a supposition of the most unpre- 
cedented neglect or foolhardiness, or else of positive treachery, on the part 
of a military governor like Boisseleau : — " La trancMer says the Duke, 
'■'n^etant qiCa deux toises (12 feet) des pallisades (around the city) et 
n'ayajii pas de fosses, les 'E's:si::siis furent sur le haut de la breche 

AYAXT Q.UEl'0N EUT l' ALARME DE l' ATTACaUE !" {Mem.Vol. I.J9.51.) 

Before taking leave of Limerick, after the raising of the siege, in order to 
sail from Ireland to France with Lausun, Boisseleau, too, according to 
Story, {Imp. Hist. p. 133,) instead of giving any praise or encourage- 
ment to the brave garrison and inhabitants in consequence of their suc- 
cess, showed, on the contrary, by a speech, as unjust to them as it could 
w^ell be, that he hated them so much as to be sorry for their victory ; and 
thus gave sufficient countenance to the accusations of those, who said, 
that he absolutely endeavoured to prevent it ! In fine, such was the 
dangerous state to which Limerick was reduced by Lausun's depriving 
it of ammunition, that but for a lucky deficiency of ammunition, likewise, 
on the side of William, the town must, in case of another assault, have 
been taken, — the Duke of Berwick mentioning, that after the king's re- 
pulse the Irish garrison had but 50 barrels of powder left. {Mem.vol. i. 
p. 52, Sf Harris, p. 288.) It is, then, to the brave garrison and the 
inhabitants of Limerick, to Sarsfield, and to the Duke of Berwick, 
James's gallant son, who watched over his father's interests there, that 
William's defeat was alone owing. For, if we connect Lausun's conduct 
with respect to Limerick as a positive deserter and ammunition-pillager, 
wiih Boisseleau's proved sympathy in his commander's aversion and in- 
justice to Ireland, as evinced by the unhandsome speech made to depre- 
ciate and discourage the Irish, even after their success ; if we associate 
these circumstances with the heavy accusation in James's Memoirs con- 
cerning Boisseleau's orders to the garrison during the assault; if we 
combine with this last and the foregoing particulars the concise though 
positive admission in the private letter from the Rawdon Papers, that 
treachery was working somewhere or somehow against the Irish and for 
the English, who, it may be added, have always had so much money to 
support the honour of the " British heart and the British arm ;" if we 
weigh all these matters duly, it must appear, that the Irish at Limerick 
had not only to resist the open enemy, but the hidden traitor ; and whence 



200 ^ THE GREEN BOOK. 

breach, a portion of the Irish garrison entered the English 
camp in their turn, and '* in the confusion," says Dalrym- 
ple, ''the English hospital having by accident taken fire, 
part of the victorious Irish stopped the pursuit, and rushing 
into the flames to quench them, saved the lives of their 
enemies, at the hazard of their own !'" 

The other circumstance is that of the memorable self-de- 
votion of the women of Limerick, who, after the English 
had beaten the men from their post, drove them back to the 
combat, boldly stood in the breach, even nearer to the Eng- 
lish soldiers than the men of the garrison, and for nearly 3 
hours, contributed to assail the enemy so vigorously with 
stones, bullets, and every attainable missile,^ that to this 
splendid exertion of female heroism, unsurpassed in the 
brightest periods of classic antiquity. King William's own 
historian mainly attributes the triumphant expulsion of the 
besiegers from the city — 

"Foil'd by a woman's hand before a batter'd wall !"3 

such treason proceeded, may be inferred from the previous facts and ob- 
servations. The Irish countersign might, indeed, have been made known 
to the English by some Irish deserter; but this admission does not, by 
any means, explain away the rest of the alleged conduct of Lausun and 
Boisseleau against a brave people, whom they were sent to strengthen 
and to encourage in opposing the invasion of a usurper, instead of first 
endeavouring to weaken and depress, and then totally deserting them ! 

' Dalrymple, vol. in. p. 42, Lond. edit. 1790. It may be requisite to 
state, except here and at note 1, p. 182, I have quoted from a Dublin 
edition of 1780, in 2 volumes ; but shall henceforth cite from the London 
edition. Dalrymple's authority is O'Halloran, {Hist. vol. i. p. 406-7, 
and 418,) and O'Halloran, both as an Irish historian and a native of 
Limerick, was sufficiently well informed as a writer and as a native of 
that city to be an adequate voucher for the fact alluded to, since, in 
addition to his reading on the subject, he was born near enough to the 
period of the occurrence in question, to learn all about it from many old 
persons, yet living in his time. See Ferrar's History of Limerick, p. 96, 
and 369-70. 

2 Tindal's Rapin, vol. in. p. 99. 

2 " The Irish then ventured upon the breach again," says Story, de- 
scribing the rally of the garrison against the English troops, " and from 
the walls, and every place so pestered us upon the counterscarp, that 
after nigh three hours resisting, bullets, stones, (broken bottles from the 
very womex, who boldly stood in the breach, and were ^'EAIlER to 
OUR MEX THAN THEIR owx,) and whatcver ways could be thought 
on to destroy us, our ammunition being spent, it was judged safest to 
return to our trenches." {Imp. Hist. p. 129.) The narrow insensibility 
of the EngUsh scribe to this noble spectacle of Irish female heroism is 
sufficiently evinced by his enclosing it in a mere parenthesis. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 201 

These incidents, in which the two sexes displayed such a 
magnanimous rivalship, that the virtues which were sup- 
posed to be more peculiarly distinctive of each were united 
in the conduct of both — in which, when the men were re- 
pulsed by the enemy, it was only to have their places sup- 
plied by the bravery of the women, and, when the men, 
with the aid of that bravery, were routing the enemy, it 
was only to manifest towards the fallen foe all the tender- 
ness and humanity of women, combined with the victorious 
intrepidity of men — these incidents, I say, require no com- 
ment — they speak for themselves — 

" The MAN that is not moved with what he reads, 
That takes not fire at such heroic deeds, 
Unworthy of the blessings of the brave, 
Is base in kind and born to be a slave /" 

So far, the campaign of 1690, in the purely fighting part 
of it, was more in favour of the Irish than against them. 
William's success at the Boyne might be called rather a 
victory over James than his army, as they proved by their 
subsequent triumph over the conqueror in person at Lime- 
rick; while they equally removed any derogatory impu- 
tation that might have been cast upon the national bravery 
by the splenetic ingratitude of the very man, who unjusdy 
laid to tlieir charge the misfortune, whicii was principally 
if not entirely owing to his own notorious misconduct. Ac- 
cording to the well-known rules of ancient warfare, that party 
which after any engagement first asked — as William did at 
Limerick — for a truce or permission to bury its dead, thereby 
confessed itself to have been vanquished ; and, in fine, the 
1,000 slain, and the one cannon and 2 or 3 standards, which 
were all the trophies of actual combat that William won at 
the Boyne, were much less than the united losses of the Eng- 
lish army at Athlone and Limerick, and the number of 
cannon intercepted and destroyed by Sarsfield. This re- 
markable repulse of William, which showed what the Irish 
could do if properly commanded, was indeed severely, 
though, as regarded Ireland, not dishonourably counterba- 
lanced by the subsequent capture of Cork and Kinsale by 
the celebrated ]>Iarlborough, with a force so superior in 
number to the Duke of Berwick's, that no active operations 
could be attempted against the besiegers. Colonel MacEl- 
ligot, the Governor of Cork, though ordered, from the bad 
state of the town for defence, to burn it and retire into Kerry, 

17* 



202 THE GREEN BOOK. 

with his garrison, preferred holding out against the enemy. ^ 
This he did, with more courage than prudence, for 5 days 
against Marlborough, at the head of a regular besieging 
force of above 10,600 foot and 1,500 horse, provided with 
every requisite for success,^ and aided by the fire of two 

' King James's Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 419. The Irish Colonel would 
appear, if one may judge of his intentions by his conduct, to have pre- 
ferred attempting a defence of Cork, attended with the risk, or even the 
certainty of being made a prisoner of war, rather than save himself and 
his garrison in Kerry, according to the Duke of Berwick's orders, ac- 
companied, as the complete execution of those orders must have been, 
with the harshness or inhumanity of seUing fire to the town. If this was 
the motive on which Colonel MacElIigot acted — and on no other can his 
disobedience of orders, that would have saved himself and his garrison, 
be rationally accounted for — his decision, in such an alternative, does 
honour to his memory ! From the mention of a General MacElIigot, 
amongst a number of great military or civil officers of Irish birth or de- 
scent in the Austrian service who dined together in Vienna, at a grand 
banquet in honour of St. Patrick, on March 17th, 1766, {Annual Re- 
gister ^ 1766, j9. 80,) it is probable that the brave Colonel, like many of 
his countrymen, emigrated to and settled in the Imperial dominions, 
where the name of MacElIigot has been perpetuated in the Austrian 
army to the close of the last century. Before the liberation of Lafayette 
and his family and companions, in 1797, from their confinement by the 
Austrian government, it appears that Captain MacElIigot was entrusted 
with their detention as state prisoners ; and, amongst the declarations 
which the prisoners were to sign previous to their emancipation in con- 
sequence of the treaty of Campo Formio, it is stated in that of 
Lafayette's fellow-prisoner, M. de Latour Maubourg, that Captain Mac- 
EUigot's conduct, while they were in his custody, presented an honour- 
able contrast to that of the greater part of the officers who preceded 
him, as displaying "no bad treatment" either "in word or deed " on his 
part, or on that of those acting under him. {Bourrienne^s Memoirs, vol, 
I. JO. 98, 99, 100. The ancient Milesian family of MacElIigot, or Mac- 
Elligod, was originally from the county of Kerry, where its patrimony 
consisted of Balli-Mac-Eligod and other lands in the barony of Trucha- 
nacmy. (MacGeoghegan, vol. i.p, 317.) 

2 Story, Cont. Hist. p. 44. The number of men under Marlbo- 
rough's command may be thus estimated : — 

Came from England with Marlborough, according to Harris, 
(p. 291.) "nine complete regiments," being, at 705 each, as 
already computed, ........ 6,345 

Two accompanying detachments from the regiments of the 

Duke of Bolton and the Earl of Monmouth, . . . 300 

Joined Marlborough in Ireland, under Major General Sgraven- 
more and the Duke of Wurtemberg, a force according to Story, 
(Cont. Hist. p. 44,) of 4,000 foot, and 1,500 horse, . . 5,500 

Total of regular troops, . . . 12,145 



THE GREEN BOOK. 203 

ships of war, that played their cannon through the walls 
and threw their bombs into the place, until the interior of 
the town, on account of its low and disadvantageous situa- 
tion, being completely commanded from the suburbs which 
had fallen into the enemy's hands, and a considerable breach 
being made, and no more than " two small barrels" of pow- 
der left,^ the garrison, on the approach of a last general 

" Great assistance," according to Harris, from 5 or 600 seamen, 
and others of the marine regiments, gunners and carpenters, 
say only, 600 



Total of men, .... 12,745 

Two of the " 9 complete regiments" mentioned by Harris, were marine 
regiments, (Story, Cant. Hist, p.ii,) and are computed as infantry, the 
pay, according to Grose, {Military Antiquities, p. 314,) being the 
same in both descriptions of force, though that writer, Uke too many 
historians where numbers are in question, says nothing of the exact 
amount of men in the marine regiments in William's time. However, 
as both Story and Harris class the marines with the complete infantry 
regiments, and at the same time make no numerical deduction on ac- 
count of the former, the estimation of both at the same amount is suffi- 
ciently countenanced by probability. The total amount of Marlborough's 
cannon is not stated. I note this, because no writer should be allowed 
to insult the common sense, and disappoint the natural curiosity of ra- 
tional beings, by neglecting to specify, as accurately as possible, the 
number of men and guns in each army, and the losses on each side, in 
any work purporting to be an historical narrative or disquisition upon 
military matters. Unless this be done — and not by merely copying or 
taking for granted the accounts given by the writers of only one nation, 
like those of ' England respecting Ireland and France, but by looking 
to, comparing, and sifting the numerical statements of the authors of 
every people engaged in such events, wherevef- those authors exist or 
can be consulted — unless all this be done by one who professes to nar- 
rate or discuss military transactions, that person is only a presumptuous 
compiler of "words without knowledge," and his reader "a fool for his 
pains," since what accurate idea can any reader possibly have of the 
relative degree of courage or of skill, of nature or of art, displayed in 
warlike operations, if he is not informed of the comparative amount of 
men and artillery in each army, or if, as is often the case, he is only 
made aware of the proportion of one, and left in the dark respecting 
that of the other ? Any book, written in such a slovenly way, should 
be consigned to a grocer's or trunkmaker's, or flung into the fire. 

^ Harris, p. 291-2. This Anglo-Irish writer, in the true spirit of 
anti-nationality that generally distinguishes the authors of his party, 
mentions, in connexion with his own admitted fact of the deficiency of 
powder on the part of the Irish garrison of Cork, that their " early sur- 
render" — i. e. after defending themselves for five days, in a bad military 
situation, against the greatest general then in the world ! — " might 



204 THE GREEN BOOK. 

assault, which, without a due supply of ammunition, it 
would be impossible to resist, surrendered as •' prisoners of 
war," to the number of between 4 and 5,000 men.^ The 
terms of the capitulation, were, however, most disgracefully 
violated.^ 

probably have been occasioned by the want of ammunition V As if it 
were only probable, and not absolutely certatx, that soldiers ought to 
have a due supply of ammunition to make a proper resistance to their 
enemies! From these two words, "early" and " probably," we may 
duly estimate the fairness of this bulky biographer of William, who 
shows the quantum of his historical justice to his countrymen, by com- 
posing his account of the wars in Ireland, exclusively from English 
authorities. As a compiler from such documents, he has, however, in 
the absence of other testimony, been industrious and useful. 

1 Story, Imp. Hist. p. 140-43. 

2 The two chief articles of the surrender of Cork to Marlborough, by 
the first of which the garrison were to be regular "prisoners of war," 
expressly stipulated, that " there should be no prejudice done to the offi- 
cers, soldiers, or inhabitants," and even that " the (English) general 
should use his endeavour to obtain his majesty's clemency towards 
them," The last of these provisoes is, by the way, a very mawkish and 
improper addition of Cork or Munster weak-mindedness, since the first 
article said every thing necessary and becoming between enemies en- 
gaged ,in equal and legitimate warfare in the cause of their respective 
sovereigns, and likewise whatever was needful for ensuring proper treat- 
ment for those surrendering, as the garrison and citizens of Cork sup- 
posed that they surrendered, to honourable opponents. But men only 
doing, and by the very nature of the capitulation, acknowledged to have 
been only doing their duty, should not have evinced such a gross want 
of perception of the civil and military position in which they stood, as 
to mention any thing about " clemency, ^^ which was virtually to speak as 
if they were criminals, after having treated for and being granted the 
privileges of those who had merely done just what they ought to do ! 
Be this as it may, the " clemency" of the English on this occasion was 
of the customary description in Ireland, and as follows. The Irish gar- 
rison, says King James, " found little compassion at the enemies hands, 
who amongst other cruel usages, were so inhumain as to refuse to bury 
those, who through misery dyed in prison, till they amounted to 30 or 
40 at a time through a seeming neglect, or to saue trouble, but in reality 
that the infection of the dead and corrupting bodys might poison and de- 
stroy the rest!" (J/emoiV^, 2;o/. II. jO. 419.) The circumstances that 
gave such an ingenious opportunity, " through a seeming neglect," &c« 
for virtually exemplifying Mezentius's mode of making the dead " do the 
business" of the living, are contained in the subjoined extract from the 
honest, unanswered, Protestant, and contemporary work of Lesley. After 
noting the conditions upon which the Irish garrison surrendered, and 
that, notwithstanding, the Irish General, McCarthy, (an officer of the 
highest character,) though he " narrowly escaped being murdered" after 
the capitulation, yet on complaining of that outrage, had no satisfaction 



THE GREEN BOOK. 205 

At Kinsale, after a warm defence, on6 of the forts, called 
the Old Fort, or Castle-ny-fort, was carried by the English, 

given to him by the English general, Mr. Lesley states — " that the gar- 
rison, after laying down their arms, were stripped ; and marched to a 
marshy wet ground, where they were kept with guards four or five days ; 
and not being sustained, were forced by hunger to eat dead horses, that 
lay about them; and several of them died, for want even of that, when 
they were removed from thence. That they were afterwards so crowded 
in houses, jails, and churches, that they could not all lie down at once, 
and had nothing but the bare floor to lie upon ; where the want of sus- 
tenance, and the lying in their own excrements, with the dead carcasses 
lying whole weeks in the same place with them, caused such infection 
that they died in great numbers daily !" Then having mentioned, that 
"the Roman Catholics of Cork, though promised safety and protection, 
had, on this surrender, their goods seized, and themselves stripped and 
turned out of the town soon after," Mr. Lesley adds, with respect to the 
unfortunate garrison: — "In December, 1690, one Capt. Lauder, of 
Colonel Hale's regiment, being ordered with a lieutenant, ensign, and 
50 men, to guard about 200 of the Cork prisoners to Clonmell, as they 
fainted on the road with the above said bad usage, shot them to the 
number of 16, between Cork and Clonmell; and upon Major Dorring- 
ton having demanded justice against this officer from General Ginckle, 
Lauder got a pardon for the murder, and was continued in his post !" — 
{Lesley, ap. Curry, book x. chap. 19.) Major General Dorrington, 
who was at that time King James's Governor of Limerick, should have 
put a stop to such perfidious and atrocious inhumanity towards the 
Irish prisoners, by threatening Ginckle to have exactly similar treatment 
inflicted on the prisoners from William's troops and partisans in the 
hands of James's army — which threat, if not attended to, should, with 
respect to Lauder's barbarity, have been vigorously acted upon, by mak- 
ing all the English or Irish Williamite prisoners cast lots for their lives, 
and by then famishing, over-marching, and shooting 16 of them, as a 
set-off against the 16 Cork prisoners so treated, unless Ginckle disavowed 
his officer Lauder's act, by causing him to be executed as an infamous 
assassin. — Retaliation is the only way of making such monsters act like 
human beings, which they rather assume to be than really are ; and it 
should never be spared, till those wretches may be taught to practise 
that humanity by fear, which they would not observe from principle. It 
was, for instance, by the mere threat of adopting this simple process of 
" tit for tat," that the rebel Washington put a speedy termination to the 
notion, in a certain quarter, of prisoner- A:///i?7^ being no murder ! But, 
howsoever this may be, it would not be easy to find, in the annals of 
modern warfare, a more disgusting instance of combined perfidy and 
cruelty towards the garrison and inhabitants of a surrendered city than 
this, which was allowed by Marlborough and Ginckle to be inflicted 
upon the citizens and garrison of Cork. Yet scarcely any one is 
acquainted with the disgraceful conduct of Marlborough on this occa- 
sion, though it deserves to be classed with that of Nelson towards Car- 
raccioli and the Italian patriots at Naples, and that of Wellington, with 
respect to poor Ney, at Paris. 



206 THE GREEN BOOK. 

favoured by a fortunate explosion, during the attack, of 
several barrels of powder, by which, to say nothing of the 
confusion necessarily arising from such a circumstance, 40 
of the Irish garrison were killed. The remainder, never- 
theless, effected their escape into an old castle in the middle 
of the fort, and, being deprived of their Governor and seve- 
ral officers, surrendered to the number of but 200 out of 
450 men. The New Fort, or Charles-fort, after holding 
out 10 days longer against the enemy, capitulated on honour- 
able terms; the garrison of 1,200 men being allowed to 
march away, with their arms and baggage, to reinforce 
their countrymen at Limerick.^ 

The reduction of Cork and Kinsale — in which the enemy 
venture to assert their loss as less than 350 men I^ — was in 
a great degree counterbalanced by the frustration of an ex- 
tensive plan of a winter campaign by General Ginckle, un- 
dertaken to extend his quarters for provisions and forage, 
which were straitened by the irregular warfare of the armed 
peasantry or Rapparees, and to cut off the greater part of 
the supplies of the Irish army at Limerick by the conquest 
of Kerry, which was their principal source for subsistence. 

1 Story, Imp. Hist. p. 1 44-5, Cont. Hist. p. 45, and Harris, p. 292-3. 
The English landed in Cork harbour, Sept. 23d, 1690; began the siege 
the 24th ; and took Cork on the 28th. The Old Fort of Kinsale was 
stormed on the 3d of October ; the trenches were opened before the New 
Fort on the 5th ; and the capitulation took place on the loth. 

2 At Cork, according to Harris's English or Anglo-Irish authorities, 
Marlborough lost "not so many as 50 killed and wounded!" and at 
Kinsale, according to the same aw/AoW/Ze^, "little less than 300 men, 
many of whom," it is added, " perished by the bad weather." But, that 
any armed men, when firing during about a fortnight's operations from 
behind stone walls against other men assaulting them, should want the 
assistance of the " weather'' to put less than 350 men hors de combat, 
is an assertion rather too tough to swallow, even on English or Anglo- 
Irish authority. The statement is evidently on a par with Sto'ry's 
already-exposed account of Douglas's loss at Athlone. King James, 
without entering into any particulars on the subject, merely mentions, 
in reference to the taking of Cork and Kinsale, that " the enemy's loss in 
those two sieges was hot inconsiderable," {Mem. vol ii. p. 419;) an 
assertion that would certainly be any thing but true, if less than 350 of 
Marlborough's force perished there ; and even many of those by that 
convenient substitute for Irish cannon and musket balls, the weather ! 
It would seem as if the "British heart and the British arm" in Ireland 
could only be weather-hesiten I We shall soon hear more of the super- 
natural effects of this same " lucky peg to hang an excuse upon," the 
weather / 



THE GREEN BOOK. 207 

With this object, a very ably-concerted plan of operations 
was to be simultaneously directed against the northern, 
eastern, and southern outposts of the territory in the occupa- 
tion of James's forces. General Douglas, on the north, was 
to march down from Enniskillen to Sligo, which he was, if 
possible, to take, and, at all events, to penetrate far enough 
along the western bank of the Shannon to communicate with 
Colonel Brewer, the English governor of Mullingar, who, in 
co-operation with his northern assistant, was to make attempts 
on the east of the river against the important fortified passes 
of James-town and Lanesborough above, and of Banagher be- 
low, Athlone. Amidst these formidable diversions upon the 
north and east, to distract the attention of James's army as 
much as possible. Major General Tettau was to march from 
the county of Cork into Kerry at the head of 2,200 horse 
and foot, to be followed, in case of need, by a considerable 
reserve assembled at Clonmel, under Ginckle himself. The 
proposed subjugation of Kerry, the main design of so many 
military movements, terminated, however, in no greater 
success on the part of Tettau, than a ravaging excursion of 
about 8 days through that county, and the temporary cap- 
ture of a couple of forts ; after wdiich the invaders retired 
from the Irish territory, in which they could not maintain 
themselves, to winter in their own.^ A subsequent attempt 

^ Story, Imp. Hist. p. 156-158, Cont. Hist. p. 48, Harris, p. 297-299, 
Leland, Hist. vol. in. p. 587-589, O'Drisco!, Hist. vol. ir. p. 208. The 
English expedition against the " kingdom of Kerry," planned upon the 
advice and intelligence of two absentee traitors or eniigres, Samuel Mor- 
ris and William Gunn, appears, through the partiality necessarily enve- 
loping the pages of Story and Harris, to have been defeated by a system 
of irregular defence, as judicious in itself, as it was creditable to the 
sagacity of the inhabitants. The country was " beaten up" or " raised" 
on every side against the advancing enemy by Irish troopers on small, 
light, unshod horses, which, though unfit to stand against the weighty 
shock of the enemy's Dutch and English dragoons, with whom a direct 
contest was therefore avoided, were peculiarly suited to the active, harass- 
ing task of quickly traversing a territory, where the rugged ground was 
naturally much more favourable to the flying hostihties of the natives 
and the swift and wiry little animals on which they rode, than to the 
stronger but comparatively unwieldy movements of the large foreign 
horses and their heavily-equipped riders. In co-operation with those 
light troopers, the Rapparee irregular infantry likewise fired upon the 
enemy, as he passed, from the rocky and elevated fastnesses of their 
mountainous county. The first alleged advantage of the invaders in the 
capture of a fort at Scronolard, with the evidently puffing addition of its 
having been " taken in 2 hol'rs with little difficulty," though 500 men 



208 THE GREEN BOOK. 

of the English commander-in-chief, Ginckle, to improve 
upon the invasion of Tettan, was attended with a still greater 
disappointment, accompanied by an avowal, in the shape 
of an epistolary communication through the Secretary at 
War to the members of William's Anglo-Irish government, 
that the writer "found the country plentiful enough in 
EVERY place, and that they must not flatter themselves, that 
the enemy laboured under any scarcity of provisions J^^ — 
an ample official confession of the total failure of the under- 
taking.^ 

are said to have been working at it for " 2 months," and with the ac- 
companying circumstance of this achievement being performed without 
any statement vdiatever being given of any losses on either side by writers 
so remarkable for details as Story and Harris, can only be considered 
as English specimens of gross exaggeration or falsehood, trumped up as 
a set-otf against the final failure of the expedition, for the readers of the 
London Gazette, (No. 2627 & 2629,) one of Harris's impartial and 
trust-icorthy authorities ! Ross Castle, in the lake of Killarney, garri- 
soned by 600 men under Colonel MacCarthy — " usually called," says 
Harris, " Macarty icho wanted a thumb !'^ — was left undisturbed by the 
enemy, on the plea of a "want of proper artillery;" though, as Story 
elsewhere owns, that, " to give the Irish their due, they can defend stone 
walls very handsomly," this " peace with stone walls" might have been 
not a little owing to the spirited defence against 100 Danes and Kinsale 
miUtia, of an adjoining fortified rock, defended by 77 Irish, Of these 77, 
only 14 endeavoured to escape, and but 5 were actually taken alive ! — a 
most gallant resistance indeed, in which English mendacity, coolly copied 
by Harris, has nevertheless the brazen effrontery to say, that the 100 as- 
sailants lost but 6 men killed and 11 wounded / In short, after relating 
Tettau's advance as far as Tralee, without taking it, and mentioning 
some absurd reports, on the suspicious authority of 3 deserters, respect- 
ing what they represented as " a general consternation of the enemy 
occasioned by this march," Harris admits that it " nevertheless proved 
of little advantage," and attributes this circumstance to a " want of pro- 
visions," — that merely shows how ably the English supplies w^ere cut 
ofiT by the Irish — and to what he entitles " hardships of the season," 
though these "hardships" are not very consistent with Story's express 
assertion, that "all things seemed to favour the attempt, especially the 
iveather, better xeveu being seen for the season !" {Imp. Hist, 
p. 157.) Finally, this lueather-beaten detachment, in fine weather, re- 
turned, by "commands," says Harris, "from General Ginckle, towards 
their quarters, and on the 6th of January (1691) arrived at Macroom." 
And this w^as all the success of the design for the conquest of Kerry, in 
which, by the forming and transporting alone of considerable magazines 
for the undertaking up the Suir from Waterford to the general rendez- 
vous at Clonmel, a considerable expense had been incurred, without any 
adequate result. 

' The words above marked as a quotation, though not particularized 
as such by Harris, (p. 299,) are, however, given as taken from his original 



THE GREEN BOOK. 209 

Meantime, General Douglas, in the north, was no more 
able to take Sligo than he had previously been able to take 
Athlone, and the generally unfavourable consequences of 
his movements in connexion with Colonel Brewer on the 
east, after the Colonel obtained his expected reinforcement, 
are well conveyed in the language of King James's narra- 
tive.^ " The English," says his Majesty, " made an attempt 
during the winter to pass the Shannon at Lanesborough, 
James Towui, and Banaker bridg, at one and the same time, 
but the Duke of Berwick sent out parties which prevented 
them and endeavour'd what he could to inolest TUEm. in his 
turn, all the ivinter long ; but nothing did it so much as 
the Rapperees who performed many bould actions, espe- 
cially one O'Connor, who, ivith 60 men on horseback and 
as many on foot, surprized 2 companys of Granadiers, 
whom they cut to pieces, then went to Philip's Town, in 
King's country, where they killed 120 Dragoons, burnt 
the Town, and carryd away a great booty of horses !"^ 

official papers, entitled Correspondence, and are an evident transcription 
from General Ginckle's private letter, in which the General's own sensible 
opinion and that of William, that a full pardon and security, in person, 
property, and religion, should be guaranteed to the Irish who would 
submit, is obviously put forward, in opposition to the brutal and sangui- 
nary avarice of William's self-styled Frotestant partisans or estate-hun- 
ters in Ireland, who opposed the issuing of any such document as that 
advocated by Ginckle, and insisted upon the Irish being compelled to 
resist to the last, for the purpose of exterminating and enslaving them in 
the name of a God of peace and liberty, and of robbing them of their 
properties under the pretext of advancing the religion of a God of hu- 
mility and poverty. See O'Driscol's History of Ireland, vol. ii. p. 213 
& 13, and p. 228, 29, and 30. 

' See also and compare Story {Imp. Hist. p. 155-56, & 58) with 
Harris, {p. 298.) The English writer, who was in Ireland at the time 
of the transactions alluded to, gives a truer and more advantageous ac- 
count, as regards the Irish, of the transactions connected with what 
happened at Lanesborough, than the Irish ascendancy scribe, who, with 
the usual antinational feeling of his party against his own countrymen, 
prefers the lying statements of a London Gazette (No. 2627) to the 
more credible though sufficiently prejudiced authority of the English 
annalist. 

2 Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 433. Story thus cursorily alludes to the taking 
of Philipstown by the Rapparees — at the same time taking care, with 
English candour, to suppress, as far as possible, the chief merit of the 
Irish, or that of their destroying the troops in that place, and also to slur 
over the transaction as nothing more than a mere affair of skulking sur- 
prise and incendiarism, unaccompanied with any loss of men to the 
English. " About this time, (November 13th, 1690,) the enemy," says 

18 



210 THE GREEN BOOK. 

In short, while that portion of Ireland within the oblong or 
semi-oval line of the Irish posts was comparatively at peace 
as regarded the incursions of the enemy, and completely so 
with respect to the disposition of the inhabitants, the pro- 
vinces occupied by the English were not merely subjected 
to the harassing inroads of Irish military parties from be- 
yond the Shannon,^ but were vigorously infested with those 

he, " burnt Philip's Town, (the chief town in the King's County, . . .) 
though we had a garrison in it ; for they came from a great adjacent 
ho^ during the night, and, having set the town on fire, retreated 
THITHER AGAi:5r !" (Imp. Hist. p. 14:8.) In the so-called " impartial" 
history of the Enghsh Parson, where every little instance of partisan 
fighting is daubed forth at full length, in which the English succeeded, 
or were reported or made out to have succeeded, it will be perceived, 
that the only important military circumstance connected with the attack 
on Philipstown, or O'Connor's destruction of the 120 dragoons, a force 
as numerous and better disciplined than his own, is most unfairly passed 
over; the mere statement of "though we 'had a garrison in it" being so 
placed in the sentence as to convey no idea of the whole truth of the 
matter to the mind of a reader. And, in this same "impartial" history, 
there is, moreover, not a single word said of the brave O'Connor's first 
"bould action" in surprising and "doing the business" of the superior 
number of the " British Grenadiers !" The suppressio veri and sus^- 
gestio falsi of Story with respect to those two little transactions, luckily 
rescued from concealment and misrepresentation by King James, will 
serve to show, better than whole pages of criticism, how little "justice to 
Ireland" there is to be found in the so-called "impartial" narrative of the 
Williamite Parson. In these two instances it may be well said, in every 
sense of the word, that " one Story is good till another story is told." 
But since the Parson was afterwards made a Dean, as Archbishop King 
subsequently became a Primate, chiefly on account of his archiepiscopal 
libel on Ireland already adverted to, {note \, p. 195,) we may be sure that 
the Parson, like the Archbishop, was well aware of the value to be de- 
rived from adhering in his work to the purport of the Spanish saying, 
that " a lie, if it will last only half an hour, is worth telling !'^ 

1 u YYg retired further into the country," says Story, " and left them 
all the passes and forts upon the Shannon, by which means," he con- 
tinues, " they are not to be kept in their own province [Connaught], as 
they might have been, but can both keep us out, and also come amongst 
us when they have a mind to it !" {Imp. Hist. p. 147.) It is needless 
to say that the Irish had " a mind to it," since, in aid of those " trips over 
the water," the territory nominally in possession of the English was 
overrun and ravaged as far as Kildare, Wicklow, and the counties ad- 
jacent to Dublin, by different light parties under various Rapparee lead- 
ers, such as Macabe, Grace, Higgins, Callaghan, Cavanagh, the " White 
Sergeant," and " galloping Hogan," who were called " robbers, thieves, 
and bogtrotters," by the English and their faction, for only levying con- 
tributions and waging a system of defensive and patriotic warfare, with 
the approbation of their legitimate sovereign, James II. ! sim.ilar to the 



THE GREEN BOOK. 211 

hardy Hibernian guerillas, the Rapparees — partially re- 
pulsed, indeed, but never entirely subdued — disappearing 
to-day, only to appear in greater force to-morrow — rapid in 
flight, but equally rapid in pursuit — and, in the sharp, ac- 
tive, and untiring spirit of their incessant hostilities against 

hostilities which Alfred entitled the Great, because successful ! carried 
on with his Rapparees from the woods and bogs of Somersetshire against 
the Danes and the advocates of a Danish " connexion" and " glorious 
revolution !" " He sought," says the historian, speaking of Alfred, " the 
woods and deserts to conceal himself . . . where there was a peninsula 
surrounded by swamps . . . Fortified in his island against a surprise 
from the enemy, by entrenchments of earth and wood, he led the hard 
and SAVAGE life reserved in every conquered country for such of the 
vanquished as are too proud for slavery — that of a freebooter ia 
the woods, MORASSES, and defiles ! At the head of his friends, 
formed into bands, he plundered the Da^-es laden with spoil, and, if 
Danes were wanting, the Saxon who obeyed the foreigners and 
saluted them as his masters!'" {Thierry, vol i. p, 110-12.) The 
most distinguished, however, of those brave Irish partisans who infested 
the Irish territory occupied by the enemy— one who, in the language 
of Milton, 



• above the rest, 

In shape and gesture proudly eminent, 
Stood like a tower !" — 

was a gentleman of Tipperary, Anthony Carroll, surnamed Fada, or the 
Tall, who possessed an estate there, and by his influence among the 
Rapparees, codd, according to Story, " upon any alarm bring together 
to the number of at least 2000 !" This gentleman (who, unlike our 
heroes of the present day, required no Special Commissions or Insurrec- 
tion Acts to protect him from his tenantry !) seized on, garrisoned, and 
held the Castle of Nenagh, taken from the English after their defeat at 
Limerick, and gave them "plenty to do" through the autumn and 
winter of 1690, and part of the spring and summer of 1691, during 
which he maintained himself in that strong hold, whence he made fre- 
quent excursions through the country till the 2d of August, 1691, when, 
on the collection in his neighbourhood of all the English forces, after 
the battle of Aughrim, for the second siege of Limerick, the gallant cas- 
tellan of Nenagh evacuated that fortress, burned the town, and brought 
away the whole of his garrison of 500 men in safely, tov/ards Limerick, 
in spite of the pursuit of a strong party of Ginckle's cavalry, under Briga- 
dier Leveson and Major Wood. (Story, Cont. Hist.p.'ei, 62, 69, 181 
6c 182. Harris, p. 297 & 334.) the present Major General Sir 
William Parker Carroll, of Tulla House, near Nenagh, so distinguished 
in the Spanish service during the Peninsular War, and now Military 
Governor of the Western District of Ireland, is, if I am not mistaken, 
one of the race of the brave Anthony Carroll Fada. 



212 THE GREEN BOOK. 

the invader, best typified by the '' vengeful hornet" of the 
poet, that 

" Repulsed in vain, and thirsty still of gore, 
(Bold son of air and heat!) on angry wings, 
Untamed, untired, still turns, attacks, and stings !" ^ 

With such persevering bravery, though deserted if not 
actually betrayed by their French allies^ did the Irish resist 
the great military and financial resources of William's go- 

* Story thus describes the judicious system of irregular warfare which 
the Irish carried on against the English quarters during the winter of 
1690 and 1691. "As to any pubHc action," says he, "little of moment 
hapned for some time after we returned to our winter quarters, tho' the 
Rapparees, being encouraged by our withdrawing, were very trouble- 
some all the country over . . . doing much more mischief at this time 
o' th' year, than any thing that had the face of an Army could pretend 
to. When the Irish understood therefore how our men were posted all 
along the line, and. what advantages might be hoped for at such and 
such places, they not only encouraged all the protected Irish to do us 
secretly all the mischief they could, either by concealed arms, or private 
intelligence . . . but they let loose a great part of their Army to manage 
the best for themselves, that time and opportunity would allow them : 
to all these they gave passes, signifying to what Regiment they belonged, 
that in case they were taken, they might not be dealt withal as Rappa- 
rees but souldiers. These men knew the country, nay, all the secret 
corners, woods and bogs ; keeping a constant correspondence with one 
another, and also with the [Irish] x\rmy, who furnished them with all 
necessaries, especially ammunition. When they had any project on 
foot, their method was not to appear in a body, for then they would 
have been discovered ; and not only so, but carriages and several other 
things had been wanting. . . . Their way was therefore, to make a 
private appointment to meet at such a pass or w^ood, precisely at such 
a time o' th' night or day as it stood with their conveniency ; and tho' 
j^ou could not see a man over night, yet exactly at their hour you might 
find three or four hundred, more or less, as they had occasion, all well 
armed, and ready for what design they had formerly projected ; but if 
they hapned to be discovered, or overpowered, they presently dispersed, 
having before-hand appointed another place or rendezvous, 10 or 12 
miles (it may be) from the place they then were at ; by which means 
our men could nevei fix any close engagement upon them during the 
w^inter." Then, after mentioning, amongst other things, the prejudice 
done by the Rapparees to the English army in cutting off' its provisions, 
and after relating some trifling advantages gained in diflferent directions 
over those Irish irregulars by parties of William's forces, the English 
annalist adds — " Yet, for all this, the enemy watched all opportunities 
of advantage, killing our men by surprize in a great many places ; but 
especially, keepmg correspondence with the protected Irish in all corners 
of the country, they stole away our horses sometimes in the night, and 



THE GREEN BOOK. 213 

vernment, backed by a regular force alone of above 41,000 
men, or an army larger in number than England ever dis- 
played upon any one point of the continent of Europe, even 
during the period of her most vigorous exertions in the late 
war against Napoleon, till the memorable battle of Water- 
loo!"^ And ^/ii5 resistance to England — supported under 
such disheartening circumstances to the Irish, and main- 
tained, not. it should be remembered, by a hostile national 
confederacy of Irishmen in general, but only by about three 
provinces of Ireland, against England, assisted by the fourth 
province, and by no inconsiderable party in the other three 
— this resistance, I say, took place at a time, when the en- 
tire population of Ireland was not^ as at present, between 
8 and 9,000,000 of souls, but, at the very highest computa- 
tion, no more than 1,500,000 inhabitants ! ^ Yet this is 
the nation which has been accused of having " always 
fought badly at home" by the superficial criticism of Vol- 
taire ! 

often in the noon day, when our men least expected it ; by which means 
they recruited their own horse considerably and did us no small dis- 
service ; nor is it probable, unless they had made use of some such 
ways, they could have brought any body of horse into the field, worth 
taking notice of, the succeeding campaign, whereas we were sensible 
afterwards that their horse were once not contemptible !" {Coiit. Hist, 
p. 50 & 55.) Such is the excellent character of the Rapparees as ir- 
regulars, given by the hostile testimony of Story. 

* England, according to Mr. Alison, never collected together above 
40,000 upon any one point of the Continent, till the battle of Waterloo. 
In that engagement, the British force, including the King's German 
Legion, was in all about 45,000 men. (Hist, of Europe, <^c. vol. i. p. 
518, 4" ^'ol. VII. p. 540.) How much those representatives of the 
" British heart and the British arm" would have been reduced by with- 
drawing the proportion that came from the St. Patrick's side of St. 
George's Channel, has been already seen. 

Stripp'd of his borrow'd plumes, the crow, forlorn. 
Would stand the object of the public scorn ! 

- See Introduction to the Parliamentary Census Repoit for Ireland in 
1821, p. VI. & VII. 



18* 



214 THE GREEN BOOK. 



CHAPTER VL 

Great preparations of the English for the next campaign, or that of 
1691, and strictures on the equally base and impolitic conduct of the 
French, who, by any thing like proper succours, would have enabled 
the Irish, at the very least, to maintain James on the throne of Ireland, 
as is shown by the events of the war in Ulster, previous to Kirk's and 
Schomberg's landing — or, in other words, by the complete defeats of 
the Orange insurgents by the Irish army, with very inferior numbers, 
at Dromore-Iveagh, the passes of the Ban, and at Clady-ford before 
Derry, and even by a fair view of the shamelessly-overrated Wil- 
liamite defence of that place. 

While James's army, whose immediate territory was 
now confined to Limerick, Kerry, Clare, Connaught, and a 
few places to the east of the Shannon, were thus holding 
out against the enemy, though struggling with the greatest 
difficulties on account of the delay of pecuniary and military 
supplies from France, William's forces, in addition to what 
they derived from the ''free quarters" upon which they 
lived as in an "enemy's country," and thereby drove num- 
bers to turn Rapparees in self-defence, ^ were daily receiv- 

1 Harris, page 282, 283, 287, 290, 295, &c. Dalrymple, vol. in. p. 
49. The conduct of William's army towards the Rapparees and the 
Irish peasantry in general is sufficiently illustrated by the following ex- 
tracts from Dr. Lesley and King James. The Doctor says, that "many 
of the Protestants did loudly attest, and many of the country gentlemen, 
as likewise several officers of King William's army, who had more 
bowels or justice than the rest, did abhor to see what small evidence, 
or even presumption, was thought sufficient to condemn men for Rap- 
parees; and what sport they made to hang up poor Irish people by 
dozens, almost without pains to examine them;" in fine, observes the 
Doctor, " they hardly thought them human kind." King James adds, 
with respect to the Prince of Orange's army, that " they cared not what 
load they laid upon the inhabitants of the country, . . and made no diffi- 
culty of treating them like slaves for the better relief of their troops ; of 
which," continues the King, " there could not be a greater instance, 
than the contrivance they made use of to redeem 3,000 of those pri- 
soners which the French had lately taken at Flerus (Fleurus) and other 
places, pretending they had so many in Ireland and would, send them 
to be exchanged; whereas they had not in reahty 1000, the rest were 
poor people of the country they gather'd together and sent away by 
force, which the Irish complained of, as a piece of cruelty they would 
have made a scruple of doing to Indians, or the most barberous nation 
in the world," {Mem. vol. ii.p. 435 & 6.) This infamous kidnapping 



THE GREEX BOOK. 215 

ing reinforcements of horse and foot from England, and im- 
mense quantities of clothes, arms, provisions, ammunition, 
money, and, in short, of every thing that could enable them 
to open the campaign of 1691 with the fairest prospects of 
success.^ On the commencement of active operations in 
June, William's regular army in Ireland under Lieutenant 
General Ginckle amounted to 67 regiments of British and 
Continental troops, in the very highest state of equipment 
and discipline, forming altogether a force of 37,549 men, 
or of 29,610 foot and 7,939 horse.- Besides these, there 

was almost if not quite as bad as the conduct of Colonel Stubbers, Crom- 
well's governor of Galway, and the detestable villains commanding 
under him in that county in 1652 & 3, who, at various times, took 
poor creatures out of their beds at night, to the number altogether of 
1,000 persons, and sold them for slaves to the Indies. {Curry, vol. ii. 
Appertdix, p. 350 <Sc 51.) For similar performances of the ''British 
heart and the British arm," at the close of the last century, see Mr. 
Charles Hamilton Teeling's Personal Narrative of the Irish Rebellion, 
ch. I. p, 6. 

J Story, Cont. Hist. p. 71-S2. 

2 Of the 67 regiments, of which Ginckle's regular force consisted. 42 
were foot, 20 horse, and 5 dragoons, {St'jry, Cont. Hist. />. 316 :) the 
foot regiments averaging 705, the horse 2S6, and the dragoons 4-13-4 
men each. The grounds of this computation are the following. We 
dnd that the force which William commanded at the Boyne, stated at 
36,000 complete, contained 3S regiments of foot, 23 of horse, 5 of dra- 
goons, and 2 troops of guards. This army, when reviewed near Dublin 
after the Boyne, formed, without officers, sergeants, sick, absent, <Scc. a 
force of 30,330 soldiers. These officers, sergeants, 6cc. consequently 
amounted to about a fifth or 5670 ; this being the difference between 
30,330 and 36,000. The same proportion that 30,330 bears to 36.000 
will each separate force of foot, horse, and dragoons in 30.330 bear to its 
complete number in the 36,000. This is shown from Story's Table, 
{Imp. Hist. p. 95, 6 6c 7.) and the rule of three, as follows: — 

Incomplete. Comr'leie. 

Foot, 38 regts. at 22,579"^ C 26,S00 

Horse, 23 regts. at 5,544 C make < 6.5S0 

DRAGoo>f 5, 5 regts. at l,S70j (^ 2.219 



29,993 35,599 

Guards, 2 troops 337 Guards, 2 troops 337 



30,330 35,936 
Supposed loss of Guards, 64 

36.000 



216 THE GREEN BOOK. 

were, in good order, either to defend the English towns or 
other posts, or to assist the regular army, when necessary, 
a powerful body of Irish militia, avowedly under-estimated 
at 12,000 men.^ The grand total of Ginckle's regular and 
militia force was, therefore, by the above statements, de- 
duced solely from Williamite historians, no less than 
49,549 men ; arms were likewise sent from England and 
distributed amongst the Protestants of the kingdom ; and, 
"' to crown the whole," this immense array of military 
strength was supported by the finest and best-served train 
of artillery ever seen in Ireland, consisting of 39 pieces of 



Foot. 

38) 22,579... 26,800 



594... 705 



ARITHMETICAL PROOFS. 

Horse. 

23) 5,544... 6,580 



241... 286 



Dragoons. 

5) 1,870... 2,219 



374... 443-4 



' Story, Imp. Hist. p. 161. That the Irish militia, from all the 
counties of Ireland under William's government, must have been very 
far above 12,000 men, will be evident to any one, from the few follow- 
ing particulars supplied by Story himself and Harris. The City of 
Dublin militia amounted to 2,500 foot, 2 troops of horse, and 2 of dra- 
goons, which, estimating the horse at the then rate of 50 men to a troop 
and the dragoons at 60, would make the cavalry 220, and the in- 
fantry and cavalry together, 2,720 men. The Queen's County militia 
amounted to 530 men, of which 430 were to be depended upon. The 
County of Cork furnished Mr. Justice Cox, in 3 weeks only, with 8 
militia regiments of dragoons and 3 of foot, which, estimating the dra- 
goons and foot at the same amount as the regulars, would be 5,659 men. 
(Story, Imp, Hist. p. 148, 4" Harris, p. 314, Sf Appendix, No. 57.) 
Thus, the City of Dublin, the Queen's County, and the County of 
Cork alo?ie supplied 8,829 men ! The difference between 8,829 and 
12,000, the number mentioned by Story, is 3,171. There are 32 coun- 
ties in Ireland. King James's forces possessed only Connaught, that 
contains 5 counties, with Clare, Kerry, and Limerick, or, in all, but 8 
counties, which, deducted from 32, will leave 24 in the occupation of 
the English and their partisans. And, when the City of Dubhn, the 
Queen's County and the County of Cork alone furnished a militia of 
8,829 men, can we believe that all the remaining counties suppHed 
only 3,171 men to the ^^British heart and the British arml" Mr. 
Moore, or some future historian having an access to official documents, 
should find out the amount of horse, foot and dragoons levied as mihtia 
in each separate county of Ireland at this juncture, particularly in 
Ulster, which, being almost entirely Protestant, must have supplied a 
larger proportion than the southern counties. We shall hear more, 
presently, of the assistance given to Ginckle by those Irish allies of the 
''^British heart and the British arm !" 



THE GREEN BOOK. 217 

unprecedentedly heavy cannon, 12 field-pieces, and 6 mor- 
tars.^ 

With this brief survey of the formidable footing on which 
the English government placed their regular army and the 
forces of their partisans in Ireland, we cannot contrast the 
conduct of the French cabinet towards James's gallant ad- 
herents, without indignation at the baseness and contempt 
for the stupidity of its policy, at a period when mere com- 
mon sense, exclusive of any higher source of action, should 
have induced a French statesman of any capacity to strain 
every nerve to maintain the cause of James in Ireland, 
since, by merely separating that country from England, as 
a distinct kingdom for the house of Stuart — a point it would 
have been then so easy to effect — France would have done 
more for the depression of England, her great national rival, 
than by all the oceans of blood and all the millions of gold, 
that she has otherwise expended for that purpose. ^ Of the 

' Story, Cont. Hist. p. 80. Harris, p. 313. The chief superiority of 
Ginckle's train of artillery to William's appears to have consisted in its 
greater weight of metal — a most important point, in sieges like those 
which Ginckle had to undertake at Athlone and Limerick, Numeri- 
cally speaking, the two trains were about the same, the king's, including 
mortars, being, as we have seen, 56, and Ginckle's 57 pieces. 

2 To separate Ireland from England, and to assist the Irish in main- 
taining themselves as an independent nation, would be the only ra- 
tional or practicable policy of France with respect to Ireland, since it 
could only be by conquering England and retaining her permanently as 
a French province, which would be impossible, that France could ever 
hope to keep Ireland in a similar condition ; and Ireland, if France at- 
tempted to keep her as a province, would both prefer to belong to Eng- 
land rather than to France, and would be able, by calling in the Eng- 
lish, to expel the French. The alleged political necessity of Ireland's 
being either a French or an English province, which one is so often 
sickened at seeing in print, and disgusted in conversation, is conse- 
quently no more true than the greatest error that ever was scribbled, or 
the greatest lie that ever was told. This is sufficiently confirmed by 
Napoleon's statement at St. Helena, when, on being asked by Mr. 
O'Meara, how he would have acted had he invaded and conquered 
England as First Consull he replied, that he had no intention of at- 
tempting to annex England to France. " I could not," said he, " unite 
two nations so dissimilar ;" but, he added, " I would have separated 
Ireland from England, the former of which I would have made an in- 
dependent republic !" {Voice from St. Helena, vol. i.p. 469.) So much 
for the Tory bugbear of the necessity of Ireland's continuing to submit 
to Tory oppression and English misrule, lest she should become a pro- 
vince of France 1 As if France could not act towards Ireland as she did 



218 THE GREEN BOOK. 

gross misconduct of the French as having been the chief 
cause of the expulsion of James from the throne of Ireland, 
it will therefore be requisite to take a comprehensive view, 
from the arrival of the first French succours that are men- 
tioned to have been of any great consequence to the cause 
of James, ^ till the reception of those supplies which came 
over with St. Ruth to Limerick for this last eventful cam- 
paign, that transferred the Irish sceptre to William, and 
terminated any national connexion with France, till the at- 
tempt at a renewal of that connexion by the United Irish- 
men, towards the close of the last century. 

AVithout dwelling upon the wretched impolicy w^hich neg- 
lected to send over to Ireland with James, as early as pos- 
sible after his flight to France, such supplies of men, arms, 
ammunition and money, as would have empowered the king 
to crush to atom.s any resistance of the Williamite rebels 

of Ulster,^ and have likewise enabled the Irish to oppose to 
t 

towards America — as if there could be but one Lafayette to assist another 

Washington in dealing with the army of another Cornwallis ! 

' James brought from France to Ireland, in March, 1689, what he 
calls "a tollerable quantity of armes," which he elsewhere specifies at 7 
or 8,000 muskets, " ammunition, some little money and a few offi- 
cers;" and he accounts for the smallness of such a supply in his letter 
of the 12th of January, from St. Germain's, to Tyrconnel, by the cir- 
cumstance of Louis's " not being willing to venter more arms, or any 
men^'' till he knew the condition of Ireland. (^Mem. vol. ii. jo. 319-20 
-22.) The next remittance of money, and supply of arms, ammuni- 
tion and officers from France, came over with Chateaurenaud's fleet, 
which beat Admiral Herbert's, in Bantry Bay, on the 1st of May, 1689. 
{Mem. vol. ii. p. 369-70, Sf Macpherson'' s Orig. Pap. vol. i. p. 194- 
197.) At this period, the greater number of French officers, in James's 
service, arrived ; but the great deficiency of battering artillery and of 
proper arms and equipments in the Irish army at Derry, and the neces- 
sity of resorting to a general coinage of copper, show how compara- 
tively trifling were those two supplies, received by the Irish from 
France. That Louis XIV. could have sent a French force to Ireland 
with James, sufficient, with the co-operation of James's loyal subjects, to 
master the whole island in a few weeks, would appear from the power- 
ful offers of military and naval assistance made by the French to the 
English monarch, so far back as June and September, 1688, against 
Wilham's anticipated invasion of England. {Macpherson, vol. i. p. 470, 
Sf Dairy mple, vol. ii. p. 152.) But, from the authentic sources of 
James's own Memoirs and the Stuart Papers in Macpherson's collection, 
we find, in opposition to the rumours of the day contained in the gene- 
raUty of our histories, that James, till the arrival of Lausun in Ireland, 
received no more assistance from France than what has been just stated. 

2 Notwithstanding the miserably equipped state of James's troops — 



THE GREEN BOOK. 219 

the invasions of Schomberg and William an effective army 
of 40 or 50,000 ivell-armed instead of only about 20,000 

one half of them, for instance, being only armed with pikes, and the 
other half with muskets, the greater number of which were unfit for use 
— a sketch of the war between the King's army and their northern 
Orange opponents, taken from the writers of both sides, will prove, that 
long before the arrival of Kirk's and Schomberg's assistance from Eng- 
land, in July and August, 1689, the Orange insurgents of Ulster would, 
in spite of their superior numbers, have been as completely put down as 
their brethren in Munster, but for James's want of any thing like a pro- 
per supply of arms and battering artillery to besiege Enniskillen and 
Derry. Before the King's arrival in Dublin, Lieutenant General Justin 
MacCarthy (afterwards Lord Mountcashel) had totally reduced the 
Orangites of Bandon and Castlemartyr, in Munster. In the North, not 
withstanding the long list of leaders and regiments for Armagh, Antrim, 
Down, Derry, Donegal, Monaghan, and Tyrone, which we read of as 
belonging to the rebel Council of Union^ formed early in 1689, the in- 
surgents did nothing at all proportioned to their numbers and property 
in a province, where they were so much the most numerous and wealthy 
part of the population, that the country might be called their own. The# 
appearance amongst them, by the Lord Lieutenant's order, of Lieutenant 
General Richard Hamilton, who marched from Drogheda into Ulster on 
the 8th of March, was the general signal of alarm and defeat to the 
Council of Union and its partisans, though Hamilton's force consisted, 
by King James's account, of but 2,500 men, of which but 1,000, accord- 
ing to Story, were regular troops, and the rest irregulars, or Rapparees. 
The Orange rebels, who were masters of all Ulster except Charlemont 
and Carrickfergus, were driven precipitately from post to post, and 
shamefully routed, to the number of 8,000 men, with considerable loss, 
at Dromore-Iveagh, on the 14th of March. The beating they receiyed 
was so complete, that it is known in their own local idiom by the appel- 
lation of "the BREAK (or total rout) of Dromore!" though Harris, with 
his usual distaste for any but Orange successes, avoids any circumstantial 
narrative of the affair, and Leland has even the impudence to talk of 
^^ superior numbers" on the side of Hamilton. That gallant officer im- 
mediately pushed on to Hillsborough, the head-quarters of the rebel 
Council of Union, The garrison, though aware that Sir Arthur Raw- 
don was advancing from Lisburn to their relief, with nearly 4,000 men, 
or a force almost double as many as Hamilton's, surrendered the town, 
in which were the provisions, ammunition, and papers of the rebels. 
The Irish General dismissed the garrison ; on learning the fall of Hills- 
borough, the greater part of Rawdon's force dispersed, fled to England, 
or submitted ; Dungannon, with great stores of provisions, was forsaken 
by Colonel Stewart; and 4,000 men, who still kept together, were 
vigorously chased by the indefatigable Hamilton, through Belfast and 
Antrim, till they reached and found a temporary refuge in Coleraine, on 
the river Ban. " The Irish rested 3 days at Ballymony. Hamilton then 
advanced to reconnoitre Coleraine, a place of considerable strength, gar- 
risoned by a force far more numerous than his own, and on Good Fri- 
day, drove back to the gates with his cavalry, a detachment that sallied 



220 THE GREEN BOOK. 

half-armed men — without dwelling upon this wretched im- 
policy, I will only remark, that when the first French sue- 
forth to collect provisions for a siege. He was, however, compelled to 
postpone more serious operations, till the arrival of reinforcements, am- 
munition, and some artillery, of which he had but 3 field-pieces and 2 
little mortars. Meanwhile, the Orange forces of Cavan, under Captain 
Francis Hamilton, and those at iVrmagh, Monaghan, and Glaslough, 
under Lord Blaney, were also unsuccessful. Some places "in the far 
North," from their exposed situations and the isolated and numerically 
insignificant detachments that occupied them, necessarily fell into the 
hands of the insurgents : but an attempt of his Lordship, early in the 
season, to extend the Orange acquisitions farther South, by surprising 
the town and castle of Ardee, was defeated by its little garrison. The 
Irish of the North-west, hearing of their countrymen's victorious advance 
to Coleraine on the North-east, drove before them to Enniskillen, with 
the comparatively trifling loss of 91 men in a skirmish at the Castle of 
Monaghan, an Orange force, under Gustavus Hamilton, estimated by 
Harris at 10,000 men. — Lord Blaney, who held Armagh with 7 troops 
of horse and 8 companies of foot, was, about the middle of March, com- 
»pelled to fall back rapidly by the west of the Ban and Lough Neagh to 
Coleraine, narrowly escaping, at Ardtray Bridge, 2 Irish parties from 
Charlemont and Fort Mountjoy, amounting in all to 1,700 men, whose 
alleged loss, without any on his Lordship's part, of above 155 slain or 
drowned, in endeavouring to cut off his retreat, was more than compen- 
sated by the acknowledged capture and disarming, near Antrim, of 7 
captains and their respective companies, belonging to his Lordship's 
force, in an eflfort to reach Coleraine by the east side of the Ban and 
Lough Neagh. Meantime, King James having arrived in Dublin on the 
24th of March, the Duke of Berwick was sent to strengthen Lieutenant 
General Richard Hamilton on the east side of the Ban, in his design on 
Coleraine ; and a select body of Irish cavalry and infantry, with 2 light 
field-pieces, under the Marquis de Pusignian, were to advance north- 
wards by Charlemont and Dungannon along the west of Lough Neagh 
and the Ban, and, by sweeping away all intervening opposition, to open 
a communication through Portglenone Bridge with Hamilton and Ber- 
wick, who, favoured by this movement, were to favour it in turn, by 
attempting to cross the river at that point. By the success of this com- 
bined plan, the enemy should abandon Coleraine to Hamilton and Ber- 
wick, to avoid being cut off from Derry through Pusignian's advance 
towards that town, after contributing to Hamilton's and Berwick's suc- 
cess at Portglenone. Early in April, Pusignian cleared with rapid 
slaughter Money more, Magherafelt, Dawson's-B ridge, Balloghy, New- 
ferry, and, in short, all the passes on the left of the Ban leading to Cole- 
raine as far as Portglenone. There, though the bridge had been burned 
and the pass guarded by a redoubt, the river had in the mean time been 
crossed by the Irish officers and their troops in the face of the enemy. 
The Orangite forces at Coleraine, — whose garrison, exclusive of the de- 
tachments routed at the above-mentioned passes, was 3,000 strong, — all 
fell back towards Derry, after breaking the bridge of Coleraine. Hamil- 
ton and Berwick entered the town, and garrisoned it with the regiment 



THE GREEN BOOK. 221 

cours, of which the Irish formed the greatest hopes, came 
over with Lausun in March, 1690, instead of 20,000 stand 

of Colonel O'Morra; and the three Irish commanders, then uniting their 
forces on the west side of the Ban, advanced towards the passes of the 
Finn and Foyle, to attack the enemy under Lieutenant Colonel Lundy, 
amounting, by their own accounts, to 10 or 12,000 men. The conduct 
of the Orange army, though advantageously posted and now assembled 
to cover their last fortress, was more disgraceful than ever. At Clady- 
ford, where the arches of the bridge had been broken down, the pass 
strengthened by a breast-work, and guarded (if cowards can be said to 
guard any thing) by between 5 and 6,000 men, the place was forced by 
a mere outpost of 350 foot and 600 horse from the Irish main army, 
which was still at Strabane, the enemy flying precipitately with the loss 
of 400 men. At Liiford, the other pass, which was also fortified, the 
gallantry of Marshal Rosen and his General Officers, Maumont and de 
Lery, was likewise triumphant. With only 2 troops of horse, 1 of dra- 
goons, and 80 of King James's Foot Guards, those brave officers crossed 
the river in the front of an entrenched enemy 10 times their number, 
who fled at the very first discharge, and were pursued for 3 or 4 miles 
with sharp and well-deserved execution ! Previous to these events, the 
Orange party of the county of Sligo, whose forces under Lord Kingston, 
estimated at 3,000 foot and 1,000 horse, occupied the frontier of Con- 
naught and Ulster, had, by the order of WiUiam's commander. Lieute- 
nant Colonel Lundy, about the 24th of March, evacuted Sligo, which 
they had fortified, and had reached Ballyshannon, as a position more 
convenient for assisting Derry, being pursued on their retreat by a strong 
party of the Irish of M(fhaghan, under Lieutenant Colonel O'Farrell. 
Lundy 's alleged motives for this order were, that the whole Orange 
strength should be consolidated in defence of the great Northern Union, 
because if that fell, all the minor confederacies should share its fate, and, 
consequently, that their only prospect of safety lay in a complete junc- 
tion with it. 

The justice of this reasoning in a military point of vil5w, from an officer 
in Lundy's situation, is evident. If Derry, the great bulwark of the 
Northern Union, fell — a circumstance that xust have occurred, but for 
the want of proper siege artillery on James's part, upon which want, 
Lundy, from his ignorance on the matter, could not calculate — it will be 
clear, from a glance at the map of Ireland, that the mere county of Fer- 
managh, then completely surrounded and invaded by all the forces of 
the victorious Irish, must have speedily fallen — Enniskillen, its only 
place of any strength, having no walls like Derry — being by no means 
so well supplied with Derry's other means of resistance, such as arms, 
ammunition, and artillery — and being cut off, by the nature of the com- 
munication between Lough Erne and the sea, from receiving such relief 
as Derry did. After arriving at Ballyshannon, Lord Kingston was re- 
peatedly pressed by Lundy to come and strengthen Derry, even with a 
small detachment of horse and foot, but disobeyed his superior officer's 
orders, till peremptorily commanded by a Council of War held at Derry 
on the 13th of April, to be with all his forces at Clady-ford and Lifford, 
in time for action, by 10 in the morning of the 15th. By a delay of 

19 



222 THE GREEN BOOK. 

of arms, which were promised, and of which there was the 
most urgent necessity, the Irish were sent but 8,000, and 
these so bad, according to King James, as to be of little 
service ; that^ instead of a proper supply of clothing for the 

the express — which, however, need not have been written but for the 
neglect of previous orders — his Lordship could only" reach Stranorlar, 
5 miles from Raphoe, with a small party. There, meeting the fugitives 
from the last disgraceful defeat before Derry, and learning that the victo- 
rious Irish were between him and Raphoe, he despatched his horse to 
Enniskillen, dispersed his foot in various directions, and embarked at 
Killibegs for England, the general refiigium peccatorum for the pom- 
pously-designated Lord Mount-Alexander, Sir Arthur Rawdon, (who, 
however, had sickness to plead,) and the other leaders of the routed 
Williamites I The slaughter of the scattered Organites about Raphoe, by 
the Irish cavalry, was very severe ; and, but for the friendly shelter of 
some adjoining bogs and marshes, would have been still more so; though 
the Irish mention the loss of no person of any consequence on their side, 
but Major Robert Nangle of the regiment of Tyrconnel. Thus, count- 
ing (iulmore Fort, Castle Derg, and the places in Ulster v^hich soon after 
surrendered in consequence of these rapid successes of the Irish army, 
that army, though for the most part so very badly supplied with arms, 
had expelled their Orange enemies, in 6 or 7 weeks, from all the North, 
exceptBallyshannon, Derry, and Enniskillen, having dispersed and beaten 
those enemies, on several occasions, with an inferiority of numbers, too 
great for any Orange ingenuity to palliate ! x\t Dromore-Iveagh, 8,000 
Orangeitcs were dispersed by only about 1,000 Irish soldiers and 1,500 
Rapparees ! — at Hillsborough, the reported approach of that little Irish 
force caused about 4,000 more Orangeites, under Sir Arthur Rawdon, to 
fly or submit ! — from the same small Irish force, another 4,000 fled 
through several counties as far as Coleraine for shelter! — and, in tine, at 
Clady-ford and Lifford, 350 Irish foot and 600 horse, and 80 of King 
James's Foot Guards, with only 1 troop of dragoons and 2 troops of horse, 
chased from the fortified banks of two rapid rivers an acknowledged 
Orange army of 10 or 12,000 men ! Under these circumstances, James's 
army, magnified by report to above 3 or 4 times its real number, sum- 
moned Derry ; their General, Hamilton, guaranteeing the inhabitants the 
undisturbed possession of life, liberty, property, and religion ! The Go- 
vernor, Lundy. having naturally no reliance upon the insubordinate 
fanatics and runaways by whom he was surrounded, prepared to treat 
of a capitulation. At Coleraine, a little before this, on his going towards 
the bridge to view the town, the soldiers had dared to draw up the bridge 
and to insult his person or threaten his life, by presenting their muskets 
and pikes at him, under the insolent and unfounded suspicion that he 
was going to desert to King James, which he neither then, nor ever after- 
wards did, being even attainted by that monarch's parliament ; his just 
and sensible orders, in the case of Lord Kingston and his troops had, as 
we have seen, been also disobeyed, by which the Orange army, in the 
last action before Derry, had been minus 3,000 foot and 1,000 horse; 
and, in fine, an officer in hh position (something like that of Sir John 



THE GREEN BOOK. 223 

Irish army, the clothes which were sent from France were 
so miserable, that, according to the same authority, the Irish 
preferred their old ones ; that, instead of 2,000,000 of livres 
mgold and silver coin, which the Irish were also promised, 

Moore in 1808 in reference to the ignorant, vain-glorious, and run- 
away Spaniards) could form no great hopes from the past of effecting 
any thmg of importance with the courage of those, who, in every en- 
counter however advantageously posted, had been ignominiously beaten 
by greatly inferior numbers of inferiorly-armed opponents-and this 
when undepressed by defeat and under leaders of their own appointment 
though they now unjustly threw (as their party scribblers still endea^ 
vour to throw) all the blame of their own cowardice and consequent 
Ill-success upon him ^s a sort of scape-goat for the offences of the multi- 
tude ! With the advice, therefore, of a Council consisting of 16 persons, 
amongst whom on y one English officer, Captain Richards, opposed a 
surrender, while all the rest, including Lord Blaney, Captain Francis 
Hamilton, and other eminent WilUamite officers, consented to it, a 
capitulation was agreed upon. The frustration of this proposed measure, 
by the arrival m the town of Murray and his mutinous associates, who 
deposed the legitnnate Governor and Council, fired on King James's 
army, and, in conjunction with Walker and other zealots, held out the 
place IS generally known. The plain mihtary facts and reasonings to 
be deduced from the ensuing siege or rather blockade of Derry, which 
commenced on the 20th of April and was ended on the 30th of July 
appear, upon a fair view of the transaction, to amount to this-lst, that 
James s army, shamefully magnified to 20,000 men by the Williamite 
writers, who could not know the real amount of that army so well as its 
ovvn General, Hamilton, was, according to the indisputable authority of 
Hamilton s private letter to James, not written for any party purpose, no 
more at the very most, upon the investment of Derry in April, than 
6,000 men, and, towards the end of the blockade in July, was, according 
to equally authentic official evidence, a good deal short of 5,000 men 
^^,' .T: f '"^^^^'^"''' sickness, &c., not 3,000 were fit for service:— 
2dly, that the Orangite garrison of Derry was, by the account of its own 
Governor, Walker, in round numbers, 7,500 regimented troops, when 
the town was invested, and, on the raising of the blockade, 4,300 men, 
of whom there were above 3,200 men still remaining fit for service :- 
Sdly, that this garrison must likewise have obtained considerable aid 
trom the niale portion of a population, stated to have contained 20,000 
ma es and females; an aid so considerable, as, during a long period, to 
make the defensive military strength of the place probably equivalent to the 
10,000 men, at which it has been rated by the Duke of Berwick :— 4thly 

did, from the effects of famine and disease, its defenders were neverthe- 
less sheltered from the very severe and consequently unhealthy vyeather 
of that year, which retarded the Irish works by filling the trenches with 
water, and to the unwholesome effects of which James's troops were ex- 
posed, as well as to the necessaity of guarding the country on the side 
of Culmore and Donegal, and also to be on the alert, in the opposite 



224 THE GREEN BOOK. 

and were in the greatest want of, they only got 1,500,000 
crowns, stamped at Brest with James's image in copper^ of 
which sort of specie, it need scarcely be remarked, that 
there was rather a useless plenty in Ireland already ; that,, 

direction of Enniskillen, against the incursions towards their rear of 
various insurgent parties in or about that town, who swarmed over the 
country to the amount of some thousands : — Sthly, that in a place offi- 
cially declared by the depositions of James's experienced General Officers 
to be quite too strong to be taken by any force so small as the King's 
without a good battering train, the besieged had, according to the Duke 
of Berwick, 30, and by their own acknowledgment, 20, pieces of ser- 
viceable cannon, while the Irish, according to the authentic evidence 
of the Duke, who was one of their chief officers, had but 6 pieces of 
SIEGE artillery in all, and were even deprived of the undivided benefit 
of this very inadequate train, by being frequently obliged to remove 
those few heavy guns from before the walls to prevent Kirk's vessels 
from sailing up the river by Culmore to the relief of the town: — 6thly, 
that from the foregoing statements it appears, that a concentrated 
Orangite force, at first containing 7,500 soldiers and officers, and at the 
very last, 4,300 men, of which above 3,200 were fit for service, were 
such imbeciles as to allow themselves to be cooped up and starved within 
stone walls for above 3 months by a considerably divided, very badly 
armed, and numerically inferior Irish force of no more than 6,000 men, 
at most, in the beginning, and oinot 3,000 effective men, in the end; — 
and, 7thly and lastly, that it is manifest from these particulars, that any 
military glory connected with the blockade of Derry is really due to the 
inferior amount of Irish troops, who, in spite of almost every possible 
disadvantage, maintained that blockade, and not to the more numerous, 
better concentrated and better armed Orange garrison of Derry, who, 
instead of suffering themselves, with their superior numbers, to be shut 
up for above 3 months to cant and famish in Derry, ought to have met 
and beaten their enemy in the open field, or have died in the attempt like 
MEx, were they any thing like what their own legendary accounts repre- 
sent them to have been. 

The consideration of this last point alone is in fact quite sufficient to 
show, what little confidence is to be attached to any narratives merely de- 
rived from the grossly partial testimony of men, who were either so inte- 
rested (like Walker) in magnifying their own achievements, or whose 
ignorant and prejudiced minds were so warped by the morbid workings 
of fanaticism and famine, that ^^ according to a credible tradition 
still preserved in the city,^^ the besieged, to use the words of their own 
historian, Parson Graham, " luere fully assured that at the hour of 12 
o'clock every night, an Angel, mounted on a syiow-white horse, and 
brandishing a sword of a bright colour, ivas seex to compass the city 
by land and water /" Indeed, as there were, according to Walker, only 
2 days' subsistence, or but 9 lean horses left, and a pint of meal 
to each man, when the city was relieved, it was merely through 
James's ill-timed humanity, in granting protections to all who applied 
for them, that the town was at all enabled to hold out, till Kirk's ships 



THE GREEN BOOK. 225 

though some cannon were expected for the defence of the 
Irish fortified towns, there were none at all sent, a circum- 



from England ended the blockade by passing up the river with provisions, 
owing to the want of sufficient artillery on the part of the Irish to stop 
them. For, had not James allowed 10,000 out of the 30,000 persons 
in Derry w^hen he came before it to leave the place, and had not great 
numbers, if not almost every body that wished out of the remaining 
20,000, been permitted to do the same for a considerable time after, it 
would have been so utterly impossible for the imprisoned multitude to 
exist on the slender stock of provisions which they possessed, that, long 
before the arrival of the English relief, the garrison and inhabitants 
would, in Marshal Rosen's words, have been ^^ obliged to surrender them- 
selves with the halter about their necks P^ And hence the perfectly 
justifiable conduct of the calumniated Governor Lundy and his Council, 
in having agreed, at lirst, to surrender the town on the honourable con- 
ditions it was offered, rather than incur what must have seemed the com- 
pletely hopeless, unavailing, and consequently criminal expenditure of 
human life and suffering, attendant upon an attempt to defend a place so 
badly provisioned as Derry was, if blockaded with the strictness usual in 
war ; upon which sort of blockade alone it was natural to calculate. 
The asserted loss of the Irish army at Derry, according to the Williamite 
scribes who swell its original numbers to 20,000, was " between 8 and 
9,000 men !" The real loss of that army, never, as has been seen, above 
6,000 men at the very most, was, according to the official statements of 
its own General Officers, no more, at the very highest computation, than 
something above 3,000 men ; the greater part of whom were missing 
from sickness, fatigue, and other causes than the sword of the enemy, 
to w^hom they proved themselves superior as soldiers from first to last. 
The loss of the besieged, principally from famine and disease, w^as 
greater than that of the Irish army ; being, according to Walker, about 
3,200 men. In fine, the resistance of Derry was rather an affair oi po- 
sition and artillery, than of siex and courage. Had its safety de- 
pended upon any thing like a Spartan wall, it never would have gained 
the unmerited notoriety into which it has been preached and scribbled 
by interested bigotry and factious exaggeration. During the bhchade, 
the Orange insurgents of Ulster were elsewhere beaten by the Irish 
army. Captain Henry Hunter, one of the 7 captains of Lord Blaney's 
troops, formerly disarmed near Antrim, having collected in t-he county 
of Down, an insurrectory force of 3 or 4,000 horse and foot, with a piece 
of artillery, in order to maintain himself in that district till the arrival of 
an army from England, Major General Buchan and Lieutenant Colonel 
Talbot set out against the enemy, with 2 regiments of infantry, 1 
troop of horse, and 1 troop of dragoons. About the 28th of April, the 
Irish officers came down upon the rebels near Cumber, on Lough Strang- 
ford, separated their horse and foot, killing from 3 to 600 Orangites on 
the spot, wounding several, and totally dispersing the rest — their leader 
escaping with difficulty in an open boat to the Isle of Man. Those who 
submitted, though they had broken their protections, and behaved with 
the customary insolence and brutality of their faction while the country 

1 6^ 



226 THE GREEN BOOK. 

stance to which the easy surrender to William of so many 
leading towns previous to his arrival at Limerick was, no 

was in their power, were received to mercy with the usual clemency of 
King James's government. About the 21st of June, the Duke of Ber- 
wick, likewise, who had advanced with 400 cavalry towards Enniskillen, 
having learned that 300 Orange rebels were presuming to form maga- 
zines at Donegal, in the rear of the royal army then blockading Derry, 
marched back in the night, fell suddenly upon the insurgents at break 
of day, beat and drove them for safety into a castle, burned the maga- 
zines and the town, and brought away 1,500 oxen, cows, or sheep, be- 
sides 80 horses. Meanwhile, the multitude of rebels who had collected 
in Enniskillen from Fermanagh, Cavan, Monaghan, Donegal, Leitrim, 
and Sligo, on the successful advance of the Irish into the North, and 
who, from the seat of their headquarters, were generally styled Ennis- 
killeners, gradually increased in strength and confidence. On the 22d 
of March, Lord Galmoy, with a detachment, probably, not above 1,000 
men, according to Irish authority, though stated in the usual Orange 
mode, at " above 2,000 horse and foot," on the refusal of those insur- 
gents to submit, commenced hostilities with an endeavour to intimidate 
them, by affecting to invest and attack the Castle of Crom, on Lough 
Erne. But the walls and garrison being quite too strong to be mastered 
by a force, destitute, as the Irish were, of any cannon — " the defect of 
artillery in the Castle being in some degree supplied by long fowling- 
pieces, with double rests, used in killing game about the Lough " — and 
the enemy having considerably reinforced the place by water, and 
having, according to some accounts, slain 30 or 40 of the Irish in a sally, 
his Lordship necessarily avoided any farther attempt at hostile measures, 
for which he was so very inadequately provided near a place like Ennis- 
killen, the head-quarters of all the insurgent Protestant population of 6 
counties ! After this, from the harassing and enfeebling employment 
at Derry of the great body of the royal troops, the Enniskilleners 
were enabled to seize and destroy a few places, either so weakly garri- 
soned or so badly suppUed as to be incapable of resisting superior num- 
bers. They likewise overthrew some obscure bodies of provincial or 
irregular Irish, whose exact amount is uncertain, and whose defeat, 
no doubt enormously magnified, as being only recorded in En- 
niskillen accounts ; and, finally, in several predatory excursions, they 
surprised and drove away a great number of cows, sheep, and horses to 
Enniskillen. The earliest authentic advantage of any importance on 
the part of the insurgents, (or an advantage mentioned by King James, 
as well as by their sectarian and exaggerating writers,) occurred at Bel- 
turbet on the 18th of June. Brigadier Sutherland, being despatched 
with 2 regiments of foot, 1 of dragoons, and 2 troops of horse, to 
straiten Enniskillen on the side of Belturbet, while Colonel Sarsfield, 
with whom he was to correspond, was stationed within 12 miles of En- 
niskillen, with 3 troops of horse, 1 of dragoons, and 3 battalions of foot, 
to cover all the country to the South, arrived, about the 10th of June, at 
Belturbet, where he received an order from Marshal Rosen, then at Derry, 
to proceed to Omagh, to protect the Irish blockading array in that direo 



THE GREEN BOOK. 227 

doubt, mainly attributable ; and lastly, and more than all, 
that, instead of 10,000 native French troops, \Yhich the 

tion. The insurgents, whom Sutherland's spy reported as greatly su- 
perior, or 15,000 in number, endeavoured to cut off that officer by seizing 
a narrow pass. Sutherland, however, marching all night, and taking 
advantage of wet weather, skilfully eluded their design of intercepting 
him; leaving behind him, to secure his retreat, a small detachment of 
from 250 to 280 horse and foot under Lieutenant Colonel Edward Scott, 
in the church and grave-yard of Belturbet, which were slightly fortified. 
This weak detachment was to be reinforced by the infantry regiment of 
Bophin, 2 troops of horse, and 2 of dragoons. But the Enniskilleners, 
after the failure of their main object against Brigadier Sutherland, having 
fallen upon Lieutenant's Colonel Scott's small party with greatly supe- 
rior numbers before any reinforcement arrived, and having been likewise 
enabled to command the church and church-yard completely by their fire 
from the surrounding houses, the place was surrendered after a contest 
of somewhat less than two hours, and with it the Irish detachment, a 
quantity of provisions, 80 dragoon-horses, 700 muskets, and some gun- 
powder, &c. — this, according to the usual tenor of Ennisklllen testimony, 
being accomplished after such a contest, without the loss of even one 
man on their side ! Belturbet, however, was re-occupied by the Irish, 
and the capture of Lieutenant Colonel Scott's little detachment was 
partly balanced in July, by the Duke of Berwick, who, advancing from 
Trellick, with a superior force, towards Enniskillen, cut to pieces, made 
prisoners, or dispersed about 200 of the Enniskillen foot ; taking a 
Lieutenant, a Captain, 2 standards, and the arms of the runaways; and 
also driving within the entrenchments of the town 100 of the enemy's 
cavalry, in spite of the fire of the artillery from an adjacent fort. Dur- 
ing these occurrences, James's government so far remedied the great 
deficiency of military supplies in which they were left by France, as to 
equip a force, supposed to be sufficient to attack Enniskillen, without 
breaking off the blockade of Derry. The command of this new levy 
was intrusted to Lieutenant General Justin MacCarthy, the pacificator 
of Munster, created by James, in April, Master General of Artillery, and, 
on the 23d of May, Lord Viscount Mountcashel and Baron of Castle- 
Inchy. His force consisted of 3 infantry and 2 dragoon regiments, with 
some horse ; the whole, according to King James, making 3,600" men. 
Their artillery consisted of 7 pieces of cannon. With this force, which 
was to assemble at Belturbet, Lord Mountcashel was to direct the main 
attack against Enniskillen, by marching along the right or north-eastern 
bank of Lough Erne towards that town, which is situated on an island 
of the Lough, while Sarsfield, with 2 or 3 regiments of foot, 3 troops of 
horse, and 1 of dragoons, was posted on the left or south-western side of 
the lake, to protect the Irish territory towards Connaught, against the 2 
Orange garrisons of Ballyshannon and Enniskillen. The Duke of Ber- 
wick, however, who, after his last success against the enemy, had en- 
camped at Trellick with 4 battalions of infantry, 1 regiment of horse, 
and 1 of dragoons, was unfortunately recalled to Derry not long before 
the march of Lord Mountcashel towards Enniskillen — a circumstance 



228 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Irish were told would be brought to their assistance by 
Lausun, they received only a modey crew of about 6,000 

that could not have occurred at a more unfortunate period, since the 
Duke, by again moving down upon Enniskillen from Trellick, to second 
Lord Mountcashel coming up along the same side of the lake to meet 
him, would have placed any force issuing from Enniskillen between two 
Irish armies, and have thus, in all probability, sealed the fate of that 
town. Lord Mountcashel was therefore unluckily left to contend alone 
with the whole strength of Enniskillen. 

The military power of the Enniskilleners, at this period, was very 
considerable. They specify their old (regular) force, before they re- 
ceived any assistance from England, at 30 companies of foot, 17 troops 
of horse, and 3 troops of dragoons ; making, with officers, 3,000 men. 
They, some time before Lord Mountcashel's approach, had gotten from 
England, by Major General Kirk's fleet, 8 field-pieces (in addition to 2 
they previously had,) 50 barrels of powder, with ball and match in pro- 
portion, 600 dragoon firelocks, and 1,000 muskets for a new levy of foot. 
They, at the same time, got some experienced English officers with 
commissions for several new regiments of infantry and cavalry — the in- 
fantry of which would amount to 3,240, the cavalry to 1,550, and the 
whole, with officers, to above 5,000 men. Of these, in the situation 
Enniskillen then was, a great portion of the infantry might be quickly 
marshalled from the male population of a town containing, so far back 
as March, 10,000 men according to Harris, and from a surrounding 
country, infested, in June, according to Marshal Rosen's letter to James, 
by 20,000 armed rebels. In fine, the actual Enniskillen force, before 
the last new regiments were raised, and without saying any thing of 
irregulars, is stated by Major General Kirk, in his letter to Walker at 
Derry, written in or about the middle of July, to have been " 3,000 foot 
and 1,500 horse, and a regiment of dragoons that had promised to come 
to their relief," — or, in other words, to have been about 5,000 horse and 
foot; and that English officer must be admitted to be an unexception- 
able authority, since the Orange writers affirm that he had derived his 
knowledge of the true amount of the Enniskilleners from their own de- 
puties. Under all these circumstances, the rational reader will reject 
Hamilton's and Harris's estimates of the army opposed to Lord Mount- 
cashel at only '• something more than 2,000 men," including what are 
called " some,^^ without saying Jiow many, " irregulars ;" and will pre- 
fer King James's fair and moderate enumeration of the enemy at 4,000 
men. Lord Mountcashel, having assembled his force of 3,600 men at 
Belturbet on the 27th of July, by the 28th invested Crom Castle, from 
which, 4 months before. Lord Galmoy had been obliged to retire. By 
the 30th, the Irish carried the first entrenchments; and though, on this 
success, they had, with the rash impetuosity of inexperienced troops, 
rushed forward, against their General's orders, to the very castle-walls; 
and, by thus improperly exposing themselves to the whole fire of the 
place, had suffered considerably ; they battered the fortress so vigorously, 
that the Governor, Colonel Creighton, sent pressing entreaties to En- 
niskillen for speedy relief. Upon this inteUigence, Lieutenant Colonel 



THE GREEN BOOK. 229 

men, but half of whom were French, and the rest refugees 
of various nations who had been taken prisoners by the 

Berry, one of the English officers lately supplied by Kirk, was, on the 
30th, despatched from Enniskillen by Lisnaskea, to reconnoitre the 
Irish, at the head of 7 or 8 troops of horse, 2 troops of dragoons, and 3 
companies of foot (making about 700 men, including officers,) and with 
the promise, says Harris, "that the whole body of the Enniskilleners 
should soon follow to relieve him, and to attempt to raise the siege of 
Crom !" On the same day, Lord Mountcashel, having heard that the 
enemy were now marching out against him from Enniskillen, posted 
himself so at Newtownbutler, about 2 miles from Crom, that he might 
either engage their army of 4,000 men, or might resume his operations 
against the castle. The following morning, July 31st, O'Brien's regi- 
ment of dragoons, and some horse and foot, having advanced towards 
Lisnaskea, within 8 or 10 miles of Enniskillen, were discovered by 
Berry, who, thinking them to be superior to him in number, sent off for 
the assistance he had been promised, and, by the more intricate and 
nearer to Lough Erne of two roads leading from the village of Lisnaskea 
towards Enniskillen, retreated before the Irish to a strong position, at 
the end of a causeway, through a bog. The causeway was so very 
narrow that but two horsemen could ride abreast, and was terminated 
by a thicket of underwood well adapted for musketeers, by whose fire 
from the thicket the passage was completely commanded. At the end 
of this causeway and amidst the protecting underwood, Berry placed 
his infantry and dismounted dragoons, to be supported, when requisite, 
by his horse, ranged a little to the rear. The Irish detachment, unde- 
terred by the great strength of this position, which was even still stronger 
than was supposed, being guarded by nearly twice the number that was 
thought, or by about 700 instead of but 400 men, boldly pressed for- 
wards. Colonel Anthony Hamilton, Major General to Lord Mountca- 
shel, getting off his horse, and ordering the dragoons to do the same, led 
them up, sword in hand, to the causeway, with great bravery, amidst 
the volleys of the enemy's ambushed foot and dismounted dragoons. 
Their fire was returned by the advancing Irish. But the gallant Hamil- 
ton having, in the very outset, received a shot in the leg, that compelled 
him to retire a little back to seek the support of his horse ; and the suc- 
ceeding officer being killed ; and no one of rank to conduct the men ; 
numbers of whom necessarily dropped on every side, from being exposed 
at such a great disadvantage to the aim of troops so protected as the 
Enniskilleners were ; a gradual disorder and rout ensued, the Irish 
losing, by Enniskillen accounts, 230 men in killed and prisoners, till 
Lord Mountcashel, coming up with his horse, arrested the pursuit, com- 
pelling Berry to lead back his soldiers to the protection of their former 
fastness. This unfortunate encounter, which should not have been 
risked at all by the Irish detachment without the support of more troops 
to flank or turn the enemy, occurred about 9 o'clock, and so dispirited 
the army, that Lord Mountcashel, hearing that the whole force of Ennis- 
killen had issued from the town to fall upon him, resolved, under such 
unfavourable circumstances, to be upon his guard, and to return for that 



230 THE GREEN BOOK. 

French on the Continent the preceding summer, and formed 
into a sort of Legion Noire ^ or a kind of '' black regiments" 

purpose to Belturbet. Meantime, Berry, being joined, about noon, at 
the moat beyond Lisnaskea, by his commanding officer, Colonel William 
Wolseley, with the entire Orange reserve of regulars and irregulars from 
Enniskillen, the united troops commenced a hot pursuit of the Irish 
army. Lord Mountcashel, having broken up the siege of Crom, fell 
back towards Belturbet in good order — making a stand within half a 
mile of Newtownbutler, as if to engage — exchanging shots by a flying 
detachment with the ad^^anced parties of the pursuers — on quitting his 
temporary post, setting fire, amidst protecting volleys of musketeers, to 
the town of Newtownbutler and the adjacent country houses, to distract 
the attention or delay the advance of the assailing forces — and doing, in 
short, all that a good officer could do in his situation to effect a retreat, 
in order to avoid an unseasonable engagement. At length, finding it 
impossible to defer a battle any longer, he drew up his men about a mile 
beyond Newtownbutler, in a well-selected position. On the declivity 
of a hill, situated at the end of a bog, through which there was no regu- 
lar access to the rising ground beyond by any road but one narrow 
causeway, he stationed his foot to the right and left of the causeway, 
opposite the infantry and dismounted dragoons of the Enniskilleners, 
whose two wings were thus obliged to traverse the bog to meet those of 
the Irish. On the same declivity, where it joined the causeway, which 
was alone fitted for the movements of cavalry, he posted his horse and 
dragoons in the centre^ over against the horse of the enemy ; and, be- 
fore his own centre he placed 6 pieces of cannon to sweep the passage 
of the causeway. Colonel Wolseley, who advanced in order of battle, 
commanded his whole front to move to the attack at once — himself re- 
maining behind with the main body to direct the operations, and forward 
reinforcements, where necessary. The Enniskillen horse endeavoured 
to proceed along the causeway to charge the Irish centre. They were 
received so warmly by the Irish artillery that they could not advance a 
single step. The enemy's foot and dismounted dragoons then came on 
through the bog — a task, less difficult in that dry season of the year 
than at a more rainy period. They advanced by degrees, principally 
along the sides of the causeway. Their object was, to close round upon 
the Irish cannon, turn it upon its owners, and thus open the way for 
the onset of the horse, which had been completely stopped by the artillery. 
The Irish stood their ground. The enemy sharply charged their right 
wing. Lord Mountcashel ordered that some troops should " face to the 
right" to aid their companions. A fatal blunder in the deliver}'^ of this 
command occasioned the loss of the battle. The officer, who received 
the order, instead of saying " face to the rights bade his men " face to 
the right aboiitJ^ The movement took place accordin^rly. The Irish, 
in the rear of this part of the army, seeing troops from the front coming 
on with their faces towards the rear, thought those troops were abandon- 
ing the fight. A panic ensued. Others, beholding the rear making oflT, 
followed, or were forced to follow, its example. The enemy, favoured 
by this ruinous accident, pushed forward, seized the artillery of the Irish, 



THE GREEN BOOK. 231 

for the service of Ireland; consisting, besides French, of 
Germans, Swiss, Swedes, Danes, and even of English, 

and turned it upon them. His horse, no longer checked by the cannon, 
advanced at full speed along the causeway against the Irish horse and 
dragoons of the centre. They perceiving their cannon turned against 
them, shared in the general alarm ; and, without once attempting to 
rally, fled from the field towards Watling Bridge. Some officers, bravely 
doing their duty, were killed, among whom was Sir Stephen Martin ; 
others w^ounded, among whom was Lord Abercorn. The rest either 
joined, or were hurried away, in the throng. The Irish left wing of 
infantry had, meanwhile, maintained their position. By the rout of 
their right, and that of their horse in the centre, they were now com- 
pletely abandoned. In this hopeless condition, they broke and fled. 

Cut ofi' by the first unlucky defeat of their right from the open country 
in that quarter — from the intervening causeway by the success of the 
enemy's horse against their centre — pressed upon by the troops imme- 
diately opposed to them — and shut out from the only avenue of escape 
in the rear, by the enemy's preoccupation of Watling Bridge wuth a 
body of cavalry — the ill-fated fugitives, casting away their arms to fa- 
cilitate their escape, ran, in the direction of Lough Erne, through boggy 
places, intricate with turf-pits and deep standing pools, towards a wood 
near the lake. And now all the merit, or that of humanity, which 
could be derived from a victory owing to chance, was abandoned for the 
exercise of the most detestable cruelty. '' No popery," the enemy's war- 
cry on that day, became, a>; usual, synonymous with no mercy. The 
bigot rivalled the demon. The human being contended with the blood- 
hound in his greedy chase and savage thirst for human life. A rem- 
nant of the Irish that survived the long slaughter of the pursuit, and had 
reached the wood, were followed into it by the enemy, where, finding 
that quarter was given to few or none except officers, even after all the 
carnage which had occurred, the fugitives, to use the words of Harris, 
" desperately cast themselves into the Lough in several places, to the 
number (as w^as computed) of about 500, and luere all drowned save 
oxE man who got through amidst tollets of shot fired after hi:vi ! 
All that night, '^ continues the Williamite annalist, "the (Enniskillen) 
foot were beating the bushes for the enexy, and their officers 

COULD XOT BRING THEX OFF FROM THE HUNT //// NEXT DAT uhout 10 

o'clock /" — or, in other words, till after a massacre of not less than 20 
hours' continuation ! Lord Mountcashel, after doing " all that could be 
expected from a brave and experienced officer," determined, with a feel- 
ing of generous indignation worthy of his royal descent, noble rank, and 
honourable profession, not to survive his defeat. 

The soldier's hope, the patriot's zeal, 

Forever dimm'd, forever crost — 
Oh ! who shall say what heroes feel 
p When all but life and honour's lost ! — Moore, 

Refusing to escape, as he might have done, with his cavalry, and accom- 
panied by 6 or 7 high-spirited officers who resolved to share the fate of 



232 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Irish, and Scotch — while, for such a reinforcement^ the 
Irish, as has been before observed, were deprived of the 

their General, he withdrew, at first, from amongst the routed mass, into 
a wood, near the place where he had posted his cannon, which a body 
of the enemy under Captain Cooper were now guarding. From this 
wood, he rushed out on horseback with his gallant foUow^ers against the 
hostile party, firing his pistol amongst them to provoke them to kill him ; 
upon which 7 or 8 soldiers, singling him out, levelled their muskets at 
him, shot his horse on the spot, and brought himself to the ground, 
wounded in several places. — One of the Enniskilleners, then running 
up, clubbed his musket to dash out the brains of the defenceless noble- 
man, when the fatal blow was arrested, by one of the Irish officers en- 
treating the soldier to spare Lord Mountcashel. On hearing this. Cap- 
tain Cooper ordered quarter to be given to the entire party, by which 
the Irish General's life was spared, much to his regret, as he afterwards 
expressed himself, on recovering his senses ! In this unfortunate affair, 
and the previous morning engagement, which may be called only differ- 
ent parts of the same action, the whole 3,600 men of the Irish force, (ex- 
cept those killed at Crom, and the few horse who escaped,) were either 
taken or destroyed — all the Irish artillery, ammunition, and colours 
being likewise captured. The enemy state their loss at but 12 regulars 
and 8 irregulars, or but 20 men in all killed, and only 30 or 40 men 
wounded. Upon this battle, which, having taken place the day the 
blockade of Derry was abandoned, was the last action of consequence 
between the Irish army and their northern Orange opponents before 
Kirk's and Schomberg's landings from England, as well as the only re- 
gular engagement in which that army was not successful against those 
opponents, the following remarks may be made in reference to the trans- 
action itself, and the omissions or misrepresentations which the enemies 
and caluminators of Ireland have been guilty of in their narratives of the 
occurrence, for the purpose of lowering the Irish military character. 
First, setting aside the question of superior numbers on the part of the 
enemy, it appears that Lord Mountcashel's troops were raw and inex- 
perienced levies, who, till this attack on the Enniskilleners, had never 
seen fire, and were fighting in an enemy's country and surrounded by a 
hostile population, whereas the Enniskilleners had for some months 
been accustomed to a constant system of partisan warfare, the most im- 
proving to soldiers, and were, besides being in their own country, sup- 
plied with excellent and experienced English officers, amongst whom 
such a mistake as that which lost the battle to the Irish would be very 
far from occurring : — 2dly, that, in the first encounter which took place 
between Colonel Anthony Hamilton's detachment and that of Lieute- 
nant Colonel Berry in the morning, no disgrace could be attached to the 
defeat of even a larger force than the Irish, by a body of men holding 
such an unapproachable position as the Enniskilleners did, protected and 
covered by a bog and thickets as they were, and, moreover^ twice as nu- 
merous as they were supposed by the Irish to have been, when they at 
all DARED to attack them in such a post : — 3dly, that, with a reckless 
contempt of truth, the Enniskillen historians bestow at Newtownbutler 



THE GREEN BOOK. 233 

6,000 of their very best troops, which, under the gallant 
Lord Mountcashel, were the commencement of the justly 
celebrated Irish Brigade in the service of France.^ Such, 

upon the Irish (who, from their losses at Crom and in the morning 
against Berry, could not be many more than 3,000 men) as many as 
6,000 and even 7,000 "regular troops," while, with an inconsistency 
which proves how little such historians can be relied on, they them- 
selves show that after the slaughter at Newtownbutler, from which, a 
retreat being cut off, so few escaped, there were no more than about 
2,900 Irish forthcoming, or 2,000 killed, 500 drowned, and about 400 
(chiefly officers) made prisoners : — 4thly, that those writers evidently 
underrate the Enniskillen numbers by about one half, omitting any 
thing like a numercial statement of the crowd of fanatical irregulars that 
must have accompanied the regulars ; — 5thly, that " above all and be- 
fore all," those writers designedly conceal from their ignorant, and, of 
course, prejudiced and bigoted readers, the main fact which caused the 
Irish defeat — an event, which, as thei/ related it, appeared so incredible 
to Story, an Englishman and Parson of that day, that he made an in- 
quiry into the matter amongst the Enniskilleners in William's army, 
and revealed the truth, remarking, at the same time, that while a deal of 
the defeat was due to valour, there was "more to the Providence of 
God ! — 6thly, that all the circumstances of the battle of Newtownbutler 
being fairly considered, numbers, accident, panic, &c., the Enniskilleners 
are by no means entitled to the merit of the very superior bravery which 
they lay claim to, or to any jnerit but that of the merciless cruelty which 
has so generally characterized the biblical fanatic ; and that, in as much 
as real bravery and humanity are usually united, it seems more than 
probable, that, had their courage been properly tried in a long and well- 
contested engagement, they would have been as deficient in bravery as 
the rest of their faction, who, in every previous engagement of this war, 
except in this solitary " chance victory," were ignominiously put to the 
rout by the Irish troops, though the Irish were very inferior in numbers, 
and still more so in arms and equipments ; — and Tthly and lastly, w^hen 
one calmly reflects upon the unmerited importance, the positive and ne- 
gative misrepresentations, and the brazen boasting connected by the Wil- 
liamite faction with this single instance of their casual success against 
the Irish, it is calculated to bring to mind the saying of the philosopher 
Antisthenes, on hearing a previously stupid and obscure people of Greece 
bragging for a victory they gained over the Spartans — "that such a 
people were only just Hke so many school-hoys, rejoicing that they had 
beaten their masterT'' 

^ Rawdon Papers, p. 316 & 17. King James, vol. ii. p. 387 & 88. 
Harris, p. 277. MacGeoghegan, vol. iii. p. 456 & 465. The brave 
Mountcashel, after being taken prisoner at Newtownbutler, under cir- 
cumstances so glorious to himself though unfortunate to his army, re- 
mained at Enniskillen about 5 months, or till near the end of December, 
1689. He was at first strictly guarded; but from his former humane 
and honourable conduct towards Colonel Creighton, the Governor of 
Crom, whose life he had saved, and, no doubt, from the favourable im- 

20 



234 THE GREEN BOOK. 

with 2,000 barrels of powder, and 20 pieces of field artillery 
— not used at the Boyne, and shortly after brought back to 

pression likewise made by his gallant behaviour, in his last battle, he 
was allowed the liberty of the town on his parole. At length, not find- 
ing that he was ransomed or exchanged, and wishing to regain his liberty, 
though not by any violation of his word as a nobleman and a soldier, he 
caused a rumour to be spread that it was his intention to escape. On 
hearing this. Colonel Gustavus Hamilton, the Governor of Enniskillen, 
placed his Lordship under a guard, as he foresaw would be the case, and 
thus released him from his parole. He then bribed a sergeant, named 
Acheson, who was placed over him, to convey him and his movables 
away in two cots, or little boat^, into which they got out of the house in 
which they were, as the water of Lough Erne came up almost to the 
door. The sergeant went off with him; but imprudently returning in 
the night to deliver a letter, and being also found with his Lordship's 
pass in his hat, he was shot. For this escape, the English accused Lord 
Mountcashel of not having acted as a "man of honour!" — that irama- 
cidate judge oi honour, the notorious Major General Kirk, the colleague 
of JefFeries, presuming to say, en hearing of the Irish General's flight, 
that "Ae took him to be a man of honour, but would not expect that in 
an Irishman any more!" {Story, Imp. Hist. p. 51.) But Harris, 
whose account of the occurrence is derived from Enniskillen MS. sources, 
sets such an imputation upon his Lordship completely at rest, by men- 
tioning that, on his arrival in France, (a country where honour has 
always been so well understood.) he caused himself to be regularly 
'•tried there by a Court of Honour, for breach of his parole," when, 
*' making the circumstances of his escape evident, he was acquitted !" 
{Harris, p. 225.) The Irish nobleman, who, with his gallant com- 
panions, met with the most flattering and generous treatment from 
Louis XIV., eventually died at Barege, of the effects of a wound in the 
chest, which he received fighting against the Allies in Savoy, the year 
of his arrival in France ; though how many years he survived that 
injury are not specified. {MacGeoghegan, vol. in. p. 465 & 6.) 

I am not aware to what branch of the MacCarthys Lord Mountca- 
shel belonged ; although he would seem, from his rank and influence, and 
from the name of Justin, to have been uncle to the last Earl of Clan- 
carty, who is mentioned to have had an influential uncle of that name. 
The illustrious family of the MacCarthys trace their immediate pedigree 
in our old national annals up to the commencement of the 3d century, 
from which period down to the intrusion of Henry II., or, in other words, 
for above 900 years, they were the hereditary princes of Desmond, or 
South Munster — possessing, in connection with the O'Briens, the princes 
of Thomond, or North Munster, who were descended from the same origi- 
nal stock, the right of alternately appointing the supreme King of Mun- 
ster. The Counties of Cork and Kerry were the principal parts of the 
immediate patrimony of the MacCarthys, and of the great families con- 
nected with them, amongst W'hom the chief in rank were the O^Callag- 
hans, descended from the celebrated conqueror of the Danes, Callaghan 
Cashel, King of Munster, who died A. D. 952, the O'Donovans, the 



THE GREEN BOOK. 235 

France — was all the assistance received by Ireland from 
the French, to undertake the important campaign of 1690, 

O'Connells, the O'Donoghues More and O'Donoghues of the Glin, the 
O'Mahonys, the O'Keeffes, the O'SulIivans More and O'Sullivans Beare, 
besides several other septs of equally respectable antiquity, but who have 
yet to distinguish themselves in Irish or Continental history. (MacGeoghe- 
gan,0^ Halloran.O^ Connor^ s Irish Genealogies.) After all the vicissitudes 
of centuries of domestic and foreign warfare, Donough MacCarthy, the 
head of his race, still held, at the Revolution, immense possessions in the 
County of Cork, with the title of Earl of Clancarty. He was the son of Cal- 
laghan MacCarthy, and grandson of Donough, the great Lord Muskerry, 
likewise Earl of Clancarty, — General of the Irish forces of Munster for 
Charles I. and Charles II. against the Cromwellian robbers and m^urder- 
ers, — afterwards celebrated, as may be seen by the Memoirs of James II., 
for his bravery in the wars of the Continent — and who finally died in 
London, August 5th, 1665, a few years after the Restoration. Donough, 
the last Earl of Clancarty, the namesake and grandson of this brave no- 
bleman through his second son, Callaghan, by a daughter of the Earl of 
Kildare, was educated in England as a Protestant by no less a person- 
age than the Archbishop of Canterbury, but returned to the religion of 
his country and ancestors on the accession of James II., his father's 
friend, to the British and Irish thrones. The Earl took a prominent 
part in raising forces and aiding Lieutenant General Justin MacCarthy 
(afterwards Lord Mountcashel) to suppress the Wilhamite rebels of 
Munster, on their insurrection against King James, after his forced flight 
from England ; entertained that monarch on his arrival at Cork from 
France, in March, 1689; was created a Lord of the Bedchamber, and 
had his regiment made a Royal Regiment of Guards; and continued, 
like his grandfather, to support the cause of his country and legitimate 
sovereign till he became a prisoner on the taking of Cork by Marlbo- 
rough, when he was conveyed to the Tower of London, where he re- 
mained till the end of the war in Ireland. Though the great estates of 
the Earl presented such a fine field for EngUsh or Protestant robbery, 
his Lordship's noble connections in England made considerable interest 
with William's government, to have the Earl restored to his property. 
But the observance of " Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's goods" 
was too unprofitable, and the example of Ahab's seizure of Naboth's 
vineyard was too suitable for the taste of the " Bible Christians" of Wil- 
liam's Irish government, to allow of such a request being granted with 
the consent of those, who, while they talked of the NeWy only wished to 
practise towards the Irish such parts of the Old Testament, as represent 
the extermination and plunder of the Canaanites by the Jews. Every 
interest made in favour of the Earl was rendered unavailing by the inter- 
ference of the grandson of an English and Protestant adventurer, named 
Cox ; in early life, a country attorney ; at the time of this transaction, 
second Judge of the Irish Court of Common Pleas, under the title of Sir 
Richard Cox, and, like the rest of such nobility and gentry, one who 
had obtained a due portion of usurped pickings from the lands of the 
original Irish, the natural and legitimate possessors of the soil. This 
worthy judicial representative of the Irish estate-hunting faction stirred 



236 THE GREEN BOOK. 

for which William's government made the immense prepa- 
rations already stated ; and an analysis of all the services 

up the Grand Jury of the County of Cork to make such a representation 
of what was called the Irish Earl's " hatred to the English interest, and 
of the little probability there was of ever seeing an English plantation 
in those parts if he were restored to his estate, that," says the Orange 
Harris, "all the schemes in favour of Clancarty were defeated, and Mr. 
Justice Cox," he adds, " received the thanks of every Protestant of figure 
and fortune in the County" — that is, "received the thanks" of those 
*'men of yesterday," whose ^'figure and fortune'^ were either based on 
or were expected to be augmented hy such wholesale robbery as the 
confiscation of the noble Earl's extensive estates. The descendant of 
Irish princes and nobles for 1400 years was therefore fleeced of his im- 
mense property by William's Anglo-Dutch faction — receiving only a 
miserable life-pension of £300 a year, on condition of his residing out of 
the country of his ancestors, and of not taking up arms against the new 
order of things established by the Revolution. " This nobleman," says 
Doctor Smith, " retired to Hamburgh, on the Elbe, and purchased a lit- 
tle island in the mouth of that river, from the citizens of Altena (or Al- 
tona.) w^hich went by his own name. There he erected a convenient 
dwelling-house, with a range of store-houses, and formed a convenient 
plan of an useful garden. In this place, he made a considerable profit by 
shipwrecks ; but coritinued to give the distressed all the assistance in 
his power, and sated the lives of many ! His profit arose from the 
goods thrown on his island, which he placed in his store-houses, and if 
demanded by the right owners within the year, he returned them, re- 
quiring only 2 per cent, for the store room; if not, he made use of them 
as his own !" He died there, October 22d, 1734, aged 64, leaving two 
sons. (Smith's Cork, vol. i. p. 166-168, c^ vol. ii. p. 196 c^ 7. Har- 
ris's Ware, vol. u. p. 207, 208, & 211.) Through the interest of Car- 
dinal Fleury, prime minister of France, with Sir Robert Walpole's 
administration, the British cabinet were induced by the heir of the de- 
ceased Earl, in 1735, to countenance a measure for the reversal of the 
iniquitous outlawry of his father and the restoration of his confiscated 
estates, at that time producing, according to Primate Boulter, the noble 
income of £60,000 a year! But the same Anglo-Protestant faction, 
which, against all law, had plundered the wives and children of the Irish 
officers who went to France on the surrender of Limerick, of the estates 
vested in them by settlements and minorities, and who had, by arbitrary 
appeals to the executive, refused the representatives of those brave men 
any justice in the Irish courts, when they instituted suits for the recovery 
of their lawful properties, became alarmed at the idea of the restoration 
of Lord Clancarty's estate, from the influence which such a precedent 
might have upon the ^^ figure and fortune' of a proprietary, "' two- 
thirds" of whose lands, according to the remonstrance of their advocate, 
Primate Boulter, to the British cabinet, " were Popish forfeitures origi- 
nally!" {Boulter's Letters, vol. ii. p. 118, 19, & 20.) On such a 
representation, the English ministry became alarmed, and " left Lord 
Clancarty," says Mr. O'Connor, " to his legal redress. The law was 
clear in his favour, A minor at the Revolution, he was incapable of 



THE GREEN BOOK. 237 

actually performed by those so-called French succours will 
show of what little benefit they were — if they were not even 
productive of " more harm than good." 

treason, and he claimed under a marriage settlement which placed his 
title beyond the reach of attaint. With this incontestable title he brought 
an ejectment, but met with an insuperable obstacle in the unconstitu- 
tional, unexampled interference of Parliament. By a resolution of the 
Commons, all barristers, solicitors, attorneys or proctors that should be 
concerned for him were voted public enemies ! His Lordship's cause 
was in consequence abandoned, and this unparalleled act of oppression 
forced him to desert his country, and spexu the remainder of his 

DAYS IX POVERTY, AND IX A FOREIGN LAND !" (^Histori/ of the Irish 

Catholics, p, 217, 18 & 19.) Of an exiled member of another branch 
of the MacCarthys, -who, like the great head of that princely house, also 
adhered to the cause of King James, the following affecting incident is 
related: — "A considerable part of the MacCarthy estates, in the County 

of Cork, was held by Mr. S about the middle of the last century. 

Walking one evening in his demesne, he observed a figure, apparently 
asleep, at the foot of an aged tree, and, approaching the spot, found an 
old man extended on the ground, whose audible sobs proclaimed the 

severest affliction. Mr. S inquired the cause, and was answered — 

' Forgive me, Sir, my grief is idle, but to mourn is a relief to the desolate 
heart and humbled spirit. I am a MacCarthy, once the possessor of 
that castle, now in ruins, and of this ground ; — this tree was planted 
by my own hands, and I have returned to water its roots with my 
tears ! To-morrow I sail for Spain, where I have long been an exile, 
and an outlaw since the Revolution. I am an old man, and to-night, 
probably for the last time, bid farewell to the place of my birth and 
the HOUSE OF XY FOREFATHERS !' " {Croflon Crokers Researches, p. 
305.) The representative of the line of SlacCarthy Reagh, as well as 
the Earl of Clancarty, also became an exile in a foreign land, at the Re- 
volution. " The late Comte de MacCarthy Reagh," says a clever perio- 
dical writer, *' resided at Toulouse, and left behind him at his decease a 
magnificent library, second only to that of the King of France. IVo other 
library in Europe possessed so large a number of printed and MS. books 
on vellum; of which scarce and valuable material alone it contained not 
less than 826 volumes. His sons, nevertheless, at his death, found 
themselves under the necessity of parting with it ; and thus, the splendid 
literary cabinet, the pride of this unfortunate family, became scattered 
over England and France. It would seem as if Fortune had not yet 
ceased her persecution of an ancient and distinguished race !" {Bolster's 
Quarterly Magazine, No. viir. p. 327 & 28.) Such are a few of the 
many interesting and pathetic incidents connected with the fall of this 
noble Irish family. Their extensive possessions might have been par- 
titioned without a murmur against the low foreign adventurer and bigot, 
but their old titles of Muskerry, Clancarty, and Mountcashel, ought 
surely not to have been usurped by the modern swarm of English or 
antinational upstarts or plunderers, called Deane, Trench, and Moore, 
^T\iQ frog by no puffing could ever expand himself into an ox ! The 
«kin of the dead lion should have been left untouched by the ignoble ass ' 

20* 



238 THE GREEN BOOK. 

In the first place, the French, or that portion of Louis's 
force properly so called, are mentioned to have alienated the 
Irish, to whom they professedly came as friends and allies, 
by a constant assumption and an irritating display of con- 
temptuous self-superiority, and a foppish and unsoldierly re- 
pining and disaffection on account of the inconveniences of 
the country in which they were appointed to serve ; but, 
more particularly, by the practice of living at "free quar- 
ters," as if in an enemy's territory.^ At the Boyne, being 
placed in the rear during the action, they did nothing of 
consequence till the commencement of the retreat. This 
they assisted to cover. But that service, on their part, was 
more than compensated by the important aid of the Irish 
cavalry, who, in addition to their generally excellent con- 
duct in the battle, in which, as far as the ground permitted, 
they engaged the enemy's horse and beat them every charge, 
also assisted in covering the retreat — cavalry, and not in- 
fantry, being, as every military man knows, the best force 
for that sort of operation. After the battle, 300 of the refu- 

' The general misconduct of the French in Ireland is attested by the 
writers on both sides. Unaccustomed to dispense with the aristocratic 
frivoUties of the service of Louis XIV., and the luxury of the continent, 
the French officers could see nothing good in Ireland, as members of 
that artificial class, the old noblesse^ of whom Rousseau somewhere says, 
that they would charge very well with Hannibal at the battle of Cannse, 
but could not endure the hardship of passing the Alps or crossing the 
marshes of Etruria with him. To such mere judges by externals, Ire- 
land and her inhabitants appeared poor, and as such, (without consider- 
ing who inade them so,) of little importance, political or military. In an 
age when creatures of art, or kings and nobles, were every thing, and 
the children of nature, or the people, scarcely any thing, such mere 
summer insects of royalty and aristocracy as Lausun and his officers 
were incapable of attempting to estimate the Irish people by that true 
and natural test, to which the honest and noble-minded PaoU submitted 
the character of his oppressed countrymen, the poor and calumniated, but 
brave and honest Corsicans. " Go," said the Corsican patriot and libe- 
rator^ in a conversation with Mr. Bos well, " go among them ; the more 
you talk with them, you will do me the greater pleasure. Forget the 
meanness of their apparel. Hear their sentiments. You will find 
honour, and sense, and abilities, among these poor men!" (BoswelPs 
Corsica^ p. 228.) The strict applicability of this description to the 
natural character of the Irish is sufficiently attested by their noble con- 
duct at Limerick, in spite of the basest opposition, and afterwards by 
their completely unaided struggle against William's superior forces, 
under circumstances so apparently hopeless, that Louis XIV. withdrew 
all his troops from the country in despair. (King James, voL ii,p. 413 
& 14.) 



THE GREEN BOOK. 239 

gee Swiss and Germans belonging to those French allies 
deserted to William's army ; thus contributing to fill up the 
greater part of his loss of 500 men at the Boyne. About one 
half of the remaining French proceeded immediately after the 
action to Kinsale, and embarked for the Continent. Lausun, 
indeed, with the rest, accompanied the retreat of Tyrconnel 
and the Irish army to Limerick ; but only to advise a base 
submission ; to march away, against the expostulations of 
the Irish, towards Galway, and abandon the defence of the 
place, in order to make a surrender appear the more neces- 
sary ; and even proceeding so far with that object in view, 
as to plunder the Irish powder magazines in such a manner, 
that, but for Sarsfield's destruction of about 100 barrels of 
William's ammunition at Ballynedy, Limerick must have 
yielded to another attack of the enemy, after that of the 27th 
of August, since there were but 50 barrels of powder in the 
town, on the termination of the last assault. The very 
suspicious, if not positively treacherous circumstances con- 
nected with the conduct of Boisseleau, the French governor 
of Limerick, in leaving a weak breach, without fosses, and 
but a few yards from the enemy's outposts, so exposed, that 
the hostile troops had gained the top of that breach before 
an alarm of the attack was given to the garrison ; his as- 
serted order of several battalions of the Irish, during the 
engagement, from the breach, so that had those battalions 
not disobeyed him, the town had been lost ; these things, 
along with the betrayal (some how or other) of the Irish 
countersign, and the first great advantage obtained by the 
enemy through that treachery; and lastly, the unbecoming 
speech related to have been made by this same governor to 
the Irish, to depreciate their success and to lower their 
courage after their victory^ and to cry up the invincibility 
of the enemy after his defeat, are, when coupled with the 
known wish of the French to get back to France at any 
cost to the Irish, and when associated with a very natural 
surmise as to the secret influence of British gold, a mass 
of facts and accusations against that officer upon which any 
remark is unnecessary. The same brief condemnation may 
be passed upon Lausun's subsequent conduct in writing 
home to France such disheartening accounts respecting the 
Irish war as to procure his recall, and in then sailing away 
from the country, at a time when the junction of his force 
of 3,000 men and 20 pieces of artillery to the 7 or 8,000 



240 THE GREEN BOOK, 

men of the Duke of Berwick, would have enabled that ex- 
cellent officer to adopt active measures for breaking off the 
siege of Cork and Kinsale by Marlborough!^ These acts, 
on the part of the French, with the vital injury which they 
did to James by crying down the representative copper 
money which the greater part of the Irish were contented 
to take on the national security,^ and for which the French 
government, at a time when gold and silver were most ex- 
pected and needed, would, nevertheless, afford no other 
remedy than a further remittance of copper^ are, with a few 
comparatively unimportant remittances of good money, and 
some supplies of had arms and had clothes, the whole of 
the mighty henejits derived by Ireland from her French 
friends in the years 1689 and 1690! This disgraceful 
parsimony was attributable to the malignity of Louvois, the 
famous French minister, which James had innocently though 
unfortunately provoked. 



CHAPTER VII. 

Privations endured by the Irish army previous to the arrival of St. 
Ruth ; great diminution of the national force through the treachery 
of O'Donnell and other causes ; and a detailed account of the cam- 
paign down to, and inclusive of, the battle of Aughrim, by way of 
showing what sort of " bad fighting" the Irish displayed " at home." 

James, who had become acquainted with Lausun in 
England, had promised to that officer the command of 
whatever French force might be appointed to restore him 
to his dominions ; and he accordingly named Lausun, at 

' Berwick's Memoirs, vol. i. p. 56. Harris, p. 283 & 302. Rawdon 
Papers, p. 316, 331 & 32. The Duke of Berwick mentions, that he 
advanced with his 7 or 8,000 men as far as Kilmallock against the 
enemy, but found the Irish force too inferior in num-ber to attempt any 
vigorous operations against the invaders. 

- King James's Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 421. Macpherson's Orig. Pap. 
vol. I. p. 197. O'Halloran, vol. i. p. 529 & 30. For an excellent re- 
futation of the low outcry of sectarian and party cant raised against 
King James for resorting to the expedient of a brass coinage, which 
was, in fact, nothing more criminal in itself than the issuing of a papek 
currency, see Mr. O'Driscol's History, vol. ii. p. 39 & 40. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 241 

his request, to the command of the French troops intended 
for Ireland. This doubly vexed Louvois, both because 
Lausun was his chief enemy at court, and because he wished, 
as we are told, to have his own son Souvray, who was des- 
tined for the military profession, named to command tlie 
French contingent for this country; in which case the 
minister would, no doubt, have furnished such military and 
financial supplies as must have at least preserved the crown 
of Ireland for James, if they would not have also enabled 
him to recover Enorland and Scotland/ The son and sue- 
cessor of Louvois, who died about the latter end of 1690, 
inherited the aversion of his harsh and imperious father to 
the interest of James in Ireland, though Louis XIV., being 
made sensible about that period of the importance of assist- 
ing the Irish, had issued orders for sending them, in a great 
measure, the clothes, linen, corn, arms and officers, which 
they required for the approaching campaign. These orders 
were owing to the zealous loyalty and patriotism of the 
Duke of Tyrconnel, who, notwithstanding his high rank 
and increasing age and infirmities, left the chief command 
in Ireland to the Duke of Berwick, after William's defeat 
at Limerick, and undertook a voyage to France. He sailed 
in the fleet that brought away Lausun and his troops ; and, 
on his arrival at court, having procured the disgrace of Lau- 
sun, for his misconduct towards Ireland, he made such a 
favourable impression on Louis in a personal interview, 
that the king promised he should be soon followed to Ire- 
land by the supplies above alluded to. The good inten- 
tions and commands of Louis were, however, so far thwarted 
by Louvois, that the Duke's return was not followed by 
any of the necessaries he had expected, and, even when the 
long-delayed succours from France arrived 4 months after, 
they were, through the villany of Louvois, by no means 
what Louis intended to have been sent. — Tyrconnel arrived 
in Limerick on the 14th of January, 1691, having obtained 
a sum of no more than about ^24,000. Of this small sum 
the Duke was obliged to leave ^10,000 at Brest to buy 
meal, &c., and to give ^13,000 to the distressed officers 
and soldiers of the Irish army for clothes — those gallant 
fellows, in addition to their constant and generally offensive 

' King James, vol. ii. p. 387, 388, & 422. Mem. de la Fayette, ap. 
Tindal's Rapin, vol. iii. p. 53. Harris, p. 190. 



242 THE GREEN BOOK. 

war during the winter against a superior enemy, and the 
various other hardships with which they had to contend, 
being hitherto not only without pay, but ahnost naked in 
that hard season of the year ! Thus, for ail other warlike 
necessaries, caissons, carriages for artillery, &c. for which 
money was indispensable, there remained but the wretch- 
edly inadequate sum of dB 1,000 !^ Besides these great dif- 
ficulties in which James's army was placed, it was deprived 
of a considerable portion even of the limited resources of 
the small territory in its occupation by the following cir- 
cumstance. A descendant of the great family of O'Donnell 
of Tyrconnel, whose last Irish representative was obliged 
by English persecution to fly to Spain in 1607, was des- 
tined, according to a strange prophecy long current amongst 
the Irish peasantry, to emancipate Ireland from the Eng- 
lish yoke. This supposed deliverer was to be distinguished 
by a red mark. There happened to be then resident in 
Spain, in which he was born and educated, a descendant of 
the exiled house of Tyrconnell, entitled Bcdldearg O'Don- 
nell, or O'Donnell of the red mark I The existence of 
such a person at such a time pointed him out to the super- 
stitious as the liberator of their country, and also, perhaps, 
marked him out to cooler-headed politicians in the arduous 
contest of Ireland against the power of William, as an im- 
portant means for effecting much national good, by increas- 
ing the courage of the lower orders of the Irish. Balldearg 
O'Donnell was accordingly sent for to Spain, and arrived 
at Limerick in August, 1690, during the first siege, where, 
from an intimation of the prophecy that his presence there 
would letid to the defeat of the English, he may have actu- 
ally contributed in a great degree to the overthrow of the 
enemy, by the animating consequences of such a circum- 
stance upon the enthusiastic imaginations of the great body 
of the Irish soldiery and inhabitants of the town. He was 
made a Colonel, and " it's incredible," says Story, "how 
fast the vulgar Irish flocked to him at his first coming ; so 

* King James, vol. ii. p. 421 & 422 & 432 to 440. I take the ac- 
count of the privations of the Irish army, and of the negotiations for 
and the amount of supplies furnished by France to the Irish, from King 
James, who, particularly in reference to the quantity of money, &c., sent 
from France, 7nust be considered the most unexceptionable authority. 
The date of Tyrconnel's return to Limerick is given by Harris (p. 312) 
from the London Gazette, No. 2639. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 243 

that he had got in a small time 7 or 8,000 Rapparees, and 
such like people together, and began to make a figure!"^ 

' Imp. Hist. p. 124. Hardiman's Hist, of Galway, p. 156. Thouo-h 
Story ridicules some minute local particulars with respect to the predfc- 
tion connecting the defeat of the English at Limerick with the presence 
of Balldearg O'Donnell there, he afterwards, curiously enough, adniits 
the fulfilment of the popular idea that the invaders vvould certainly he 
defeated. " I have heard," says he, " some of the Irish tell us before we 
got thither, that we should not succeed at the first siege of Limerick: 
and they had 7io other reason for it but because one of their psophe- 
siEs said so r {Cont. Hist. p. 146.) This, indeed, is only one out of 
several such odd and yet well-authenticated instances of the existence 
and accomplishment of ancient Irish prophecies. Thus, Sir George 
Carew, who fought at the battle of Kinsale in 1601, which may be said 
to have decided the first real submission of Ireland to England, says, 
(after first hoping nobody would suppose him to be a believer in what 
he calls "idle prophecies, the most whereof are coyned after things are 
done,") that he was often told by the Earl of Thomond about an an- 
cient book of Irish prophecies, which the Earl himself had seen, in 
which It was mentioned, that, " towards the latter days," there should 
be a battle fought between the Irish and the English near Kinsale, in a 
place, the name of which was exactly stated ; that this circumstance 
was often mentioned by the Earl, during the siege of Kinsale, previous 
to the battle ; and that, the day after the engagement, the Earl and he, 
having ridden out together to view the dead, and, having asked some 
people who happened to be there, what was that place called, they, 
without knowing why the question was asked, stated the very name 
" which the Earl so often before had reported I" (Pacata Hibernia, p. 
235 6c 6.) The existence and exact accomplishment of this prediction 
IS also certified by the Secretary of the commander of the English army, 
Lord Deputy Mountjoy.— " The same day," says that writer, meaning 
that on which the action was fought, "an old written book was showed 
to the Lord Deputy, wherein was a prophecy naming the ford and 
hill where the battle was given, and foretelling a great overthrow to 
hefal the Irish in that place /" (Mori/son, Hist, vol ii. p. 52.) And 
in Cox's account of the battle of Knocknaclashv, the last engagement 
fought between the Irish loyalist forces under Lord Muskerrv and the 
Cromweliian commander. Lord Broghill, on the 20th of Julv, 1652, it 
IS related, that the Enghsh General, having passed the Blackvvater early 
on the morning of the action, " met with some Irish gentlemen under 
his protection, who told him they came thither out of curiositv, because 
of a PROPHECY amongst them, that the last battle in Ireland should 

be fought at Knockxaclashy I Whereupon the Lord Broghill 

asked them, ivho was to have the victory by their prophecy ; they 
shook their heads and said, the English !" (Cox, Hist. vol. u.\. 67 
and 68. ^ 

At various other periods of Irish bistor}^ allusions are likewise made 
to old national prophecies, of which numbers yet exist in writing ; as, 
for instance, in the Harleian Library, amongst the catalogue of whose 
MSS. mention is made of a copy of Irish history and prophecies^ written 



244 THE GREEN BOOK. 

The utterly worthless or unprincipled character of the 
man was, however, so soon perceived or suspected, that he 
was speedily deserted by the multitudes that first flocked 
around him, and he was compelled to retire from amongst 
the comparatively enlightened population about Limerick 
and the other great garrison towns, to recruit his lost num- 
bers amonof the ruder and more credulous inhabitants of the 
extreme western or less civilized districts of Connaught.^ 

in the 10th century, or about 200 years before the English invasion, "in 
the old Irish language;" and again, in the Bodleian Library, where, on 
an old vellum MS. of 140 large pages, there are the alleged prophecies 
of the famous Columbkill and several other Irish saints. {Selections 
from the Gentleman^ s Magazine, vol. it. p. 31. Nicholson'' s Irish His- 
torical Library, chap. iii. p. 34.) "The fall of Ireland," says honest 
Taaffe, "was prophesied by its great Apostle Saint Patrick, and after- 
wards by many of its Saints, who all agreed in promising it a glori- 
ous RESURRECTION I" {Hist. vol. I. /?. 371.) The former part of this 
assertion respecting the predicted "fall" of Ireland is remarkably counte- 
nanced by the following lines, translated and printed along with the origi- 
nal Irish by Mr. Hardiman, (Irish Minst., vol. ii.p. 136,) from St. Brecan, 
or Braccan, who flourished A. D. 640, and who is mentioned by Cam- 
brensis, above 500 years after, and nearly 4 centuries before the Reforma- 
tion, as one of the 4 celebrated Irish Saints and prophets, namely, 
Patrick, Columbkill, Moling, and Braccan, whose works, in Irish, were 
extant in his time. ( Ware's Irish Writers by Harris, p. 29 & 32.) 
The prophetic verses run thus — 

Erin's white-crested billow shall sleep on the shore, 
And its voice shall be mute, while the spoilers glide o'er ; 
And the stranger shall give a new priest to each shrine, 
And the sceptre shall wrest from her own regal line ! 

A prediction strictly verified in the fine season of the year in which the 
earlier Anglo-Norman adventurers came over to Ireland, and in the pros- 
perous passage of the remainder at a later or less propitious season, as 
well as in the other generally-known and more fatal consequences, in 
" church and state," of that invasion, to the Milesian Irish. From mo- 
tives of patriotic enthusiasm, if not from considerations of mere literary 
and philosophical curiosity, such old Irish works are therefore not un- 
worthy of examination. 

^ Mr. O'Driscol's character of this impostor and traitor is too well 
drawn to be omitted. " He was," says that gentleman, " a man of a 
class of which many specimens have been seen in Ireland : he was a 
great boaster, suspected to be a coward, known to be a knave, noisy, 
insolent, presumptuous and corrupt. He used his popularity to collect 
round him some thousands of the peasantry ; and he employed the im- 
portance he derived from this multitude of followers to betray their cause, 
and to sell himself at a better price to the British commander." (Hist, 
vol. II. p. 288 sfe 9.) More of this, by and by. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 245 

There, by professing to advocate extreme political measures, 
the usual scheme of traitors to gain the vulgar, or, in other 
words, by announcing his intention of making Ireland a 
completely separate kingdom from England, and of placing 
the government in the hands of the ancient Irish alone, he 
became a sort of independent commander, and raised no less 
than 8 regiments — most probably infantry, which, accord- 
ing to the general amount of King James's foot regiments, 
would, exclusive of officers, make 6,240 men.^ With these 
and a crowd of disorderly vagabonds, he lived at discretion 
upon the country, to the ruin of the inhabitants. And thus 
were the Irish regular forces doubly weakened, first by 
being deprived of the services of so many men when their 
aid was most requisite, and next by the diminution even of 
the scanty subsistence which it was absolutely necessary to 
draw from the people, in the absence of any greater allow- 
ance of pay to each soldier than the miserably inadequate 
sum of a penny a day \^ 

At last, on the 8th of May, when the distress of the Irish 
had reached its highest pitch, the French fleet, with Lieute- 
nant General St. Ruth and other officers of his nation, ar- 
rived at Limerick. This fleet, whose appearance in the 
Shannon the Irish welcomed with their characteristic en- 
thusiasm, hailing its arrival, says King James, with a " Te 
Deum, like the gaining of a victory," brought over some 
arms, ammunition, provisions and clothes — the provisions 
and clothes being, however, so deficient both in quantity 
and quality as to give general dissatisfaction; while, of 
money, which was most wanted, none at all came ! Yet, 
►notwithstanding the wretchedness of such a supply, at a 
time when necessaries for an army of 25,000 men were ex- 
pected, the Irish had to furnish Louvois with 1,200 recruits 
for the Brigade in France.^ These recruits, without taking 
into account the great " wear and tear" of the military popu- 
lation of Ireland by the war, completed the number of above 

1 King James, vol. ii. p. 434 & 461. Story, Cont. Hist. p. 31. 

2 King James, vol. ii. p. 451 . From the general picture given by the 
royal author of the excessive privations and miseries to vs^hich the Irish 
were reduced through the barbarous neglect of the French minister 
Louvois, I question whether any other troops in the world, except, per- 
haps, the Poles, would have continued to serve and fight as the Irish 
did for James. 

3 King James, vol. ii. p. 437, &c. Story, Cont. Hist. p. 77, 78, & 
92. Harris, p. 312. 

21 



246 THE GREEN BOOK. 

21,000 men, whose assistance the country was unfortunately 
deprived of, from the commencement of the struggle against 
England to the period now in question. Near 4,000 of the 
flower of the Irish regular army had heen sent over to 
England to King James at the time of the Revolution, and 
detained there by William ;^ 6,000, as we have seen, went 
to France under Lord Mountcashel; more than 8 regiments, 
or upwards of 6,200 men, were now subtracted from the 
national strength by the traitor O'Donnell : and the 1,200 
recruits exacted by Louvois, in addition to between 3 and 
4,000 men who w^ent to France at various periods not par- 
ticularized, make up the total of this heavy loss I^ Under 
these circumstances, the difliculty of levying from about 8 
harassed counties, and with such miserably inadequate sup- 
plies, a force, capable of at all meeting Ginckle's in the 
field, may be easily conceived ! 

At length by the generous alacrity and high national spirit 
of the people themselves, who, however divided, betrayed, 
or unfortunate they may have been, have never yet been 
'' found wanting" to the cause of their country ; by the in- 
defatigable assiduity of the honest and zealous Duke of 
Tyrconnel, who had strained every nerve during the winter 
and spring to equip the soldiery for the approaching cam- 
paign ; by a proclamation of his, on the r2th of May, sum- 
moning all the Rapparees into Connaught to supply recruits 
for the army ; by the incessant activity of those vigilant 
and daring irregulars, in ''making away with" the horses 
of the English army, both at. night and in the open day ; 

1 Harris, p. 141 & 186. 

2 This last mentioned body of between 3 and 4,000 Irish are thus 
accounted for. King James states that the Irish who came over to 
France, after the surrender of Limerick, made, with those who came 
before, " near 30,000 men." {Mem. vol. ii. p. 465.) The army which 
arrived in France from Limerick, consisted of 19,059 men. {Mac- 
Geoghegan, vol. iii. p. 465.) Lord Mountcashel's Brigade of 6,000 
men and the 1,200 recruits given to Louvois would form, along with 
19,059, but 26,259 men — thus leaving a complement of between 3 and 
4,000 men necessary in order to make up the above-stated number of 
" near 30,000." I am inclined to think, that this body of between 3 and 
4,000 Irish were shipped away from time to time to France, for the pur- 
pose of keeping up the numbers of the Brigade, in its hard service on 
the Continent. If Ireland, by the way, had the benefit, at the Boyne or 
Aughrim, of the 21,000, or even of half of the 21,000 absentees^ speci- 
fied in the text, where would the " British heart and the British arm" 
be then 1 



THE GREEN BOOK. 247 

by the seizure of the horses of the gentry, to complete the 
number still requisite for mounting the cavalry ; " by pay- 
ing tradesmen and workmen," says King James, " part 
money, part little necessaries of apparel, part fair ivords 
and ^3xt promises, of which," he adds, "they ivere liberal 
enough,'''' 170 caissons, 400 " small cartes," with "car- 
riages for 10 field-pieces," were "got to gather ;" and, in 
fine, an army assembled under St. Ruth, to oppose the 
enemy's intended passage of the Shannon at Athlone, 
amounting to something above 20,000 men.^ The collec- 
tion of such a force by the Irish, under the numerous ob- 
stacles and discouragements with which they had at that 
period to contend, was a most honourable, and, indeed, a 
most wonderful display of national patriotism, loyalty, and 
courage ! 

On the 30th of May, while the Irish army, which might 
have been enabled by France to anticipate the enemy in 
taking the field, were still in the very midst of their military 
preparations,^ General Ginckle left Dublin for MuUingar to 
open the campaign. To do this, with a vigour and expedi- 
tion that would compensate for the late period of the season 
to which he was obliged to postpone the commencement of 
active operations, he not only resigned the protection of the 
country against the Irish army and Rapparees almost en- 
tirely to the Irish militia, but even caused as great a number 
of the militia as could be spared from that service to be 
marched to the aid of the large body of regular troops, 
which he had drawn together to serve under his own im- 
mediate command.^ On the 31st, he reached Mullingar, 
the fortifications of which he so contracted as to leave as 
few men as possible in the place. He found there 8 regi- 
ments of infantry, 6 of horse, and 1 of dragoons, in the 
finest condition. On the 6th of June, he was joined at 
Rathconrath, about 6 miles from Mullingar, by 9 regiments 
of foot, 2 of dragoons, and 12 troops of horse, under Lieu- 
tenant General Douglas. This force of 17 regiments of 
foot, 6 regiments and 12 troops of horse, and 3 regiments 

' The above enumeration of the infantry and cavalry of the Irish army, 
(rated by Story, Harris, et hoc germs omne, so high as 25,000 men, or 
at 20,000 foot and 6,000 horse and dragoons,) will be accounted for 
farther on. 

2 King James, vol. ii. p. 440, 50 & 52. 

3 Harris, p. 313, 14, 17, &c. Story, Cont. Hist. p. 110, &c. 



248 THE GREEN BOOK. 

of dragoons, would make between 15 and 16,000 men.^ 
These troops were, according to King James, still further 
strengthened by the arrival of the forces from Scotland, that 
under Major General Mackay had reduced the Highlanders 
to submission after the death of the gallant Dundee at Killi- 
crankie — though of either the exact or probable mmiber of 
jMackay's contingent, (which must have been very con- 
siderable,) nothing at all is said by those English or Anglo- 
Irish writers, Tindal and Harris, who confirm the King's 
assertion respecting the junction of the Scotch veteran and 
his soldiers to Ginckle's army.^ With such an army, and 
aided by the military talents and experience of iNIajors Ge- 
neral Ruvigny and Talmash, Lieutenant General Scraven- 
niore, and Sir Martin Beckman, Chief Engineer and Super- 
intendent of Artillery — all sent over expressly from Eng- 
land by William to take part in the campaign — Ginckle 
directed his march against the fort of Ballymore, the fron- 
tier post of the Irish on this side of the Shannon, and came 
before the place about 12 o'clock, on the 7th of June. The 
fort lay to the right of the town after which it was called, 
and at nearly an equal distance from Mullingar and Athlone, 
or almost 10 miles from each. It consisted of a little pe- 
ninsula of about 10 acres of land, at the south-western ex- 

1 Harris, p. 313. Story, Cont. Hist. p. 81 & 86. The names and 
description of the regiments above mentioned may be seen and ascertained 
by a reference to the last cited pages of Story, as compared with his table 
of William's army. {Imp. Hist. p. 95-97.) The number to which those 
regiments amounted is computed according to the scale, already set forth 
and proved at length in this work, note 2, p. 215. The 12 troops of 
horse, reckoned at the then usual rate of 50 privates to a troop, {Har- 
ris, p. 220, and Appendix, No. 57, p. Ixxii.,) would make Ginckle's 
force as many as 15,630, and, with an allowance for the officers to those 
12 troops, still nearer 16,000 men. 

2 King James, vol. ii. p. 452. Tindal's Rapin, vol. in. p. 117. 
Harris, p. 313. King James states the army of William's commander, 
Major General Mackay, at KilUcrankie, at 4,500 foot, and 2 troops of 
horse, or, including the officers of the latter, at somewhat above 4,600 
men in all — {Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 350.) The loss of this army in the 
battle was, of course, subsequently made up ; and Mackay's army could 
not have included the tukole regular force in Scotland. According to a 
passage in Tindal which I have read, but cannot at present recover, the 
army of Scotland, estimating it by the money granted for its pay by 
government, was 6,000 men — a force which, after allowing the retention 
of an ample number for the preservation of the peace of the country on 
the extinction of the Highland insurrection, would admit of the trans- 
mission of 2,000 men, at the very least, to Ireland. 



THE GREEX BOOK. 249 

tremity of a Lough. The entrance to this peninsula was 
from the south, by a single road along the isthmus, the 
traversable part of which was greatly narrowed by an ex- 
tensive bog sloping off from the south-west in a north- 
western direction. The isthmus, where there was an 
access to the peninsula from the continent, w^as crossed or 
guarded by a wall and ditches. The lake towards the north 
and north-east widened so much as to render cannon useless 
from thence against the peninsula. From these points 
it was consequently unassailable except by soldiers in 
boats ; and the waters of the Lough on the south and 
south-east, where the opposite shores of the peninsula and 
main-land came very near to one another in a curving 
direction from south-east to south-west, winded in such a 
manner between the two shores, as to form a sort of natural 
but narrow fosse around the peninsula. 

The Irish, perceiving the facilities which a body of their 
men would have, in such a post, to harass the neighbouring 
English garrisons and territory, had, during the preceding 
winter, seized on and fortified it ; and, on the approach of 
spring, they strengthened it from Athlone with a detachment 
of regular troops, under Lieutenant Colonel Ulick Burke. 
The garrison, including regulars and irregulars — the great 
majority consisting of the former description of force — 
amounted to about 1,130 men, of whom, however, some 
of the irregulars were unarmed. The place was, in fact, 
much better suited for such an outpost of annoyance in irre- 
gular war as that for which it was originally occupied, than 
calculated to stand any thing like a regular siege from such 
a powerful army as Ginckle's. The fortifications were by 
no means capable of supporting, for any length of time, the 
heavy fire of the formidable battering train which the Eng- 
lish possessed ; every part of the fort was completely over- 
looked, or, in military language, commanded, from an 
adjoining eminence ; the cannon of the Irish garrison con- 
sisted of but '' 2 small pieces, mounted itpon old cart 
wheels;'''' and, what was still worse, the stock of powder in 
the place was totally insufficient for a protracted defence. 
The Irish governor, however, gave the enemy's advanced 
parties as warm a reception as he could with his small shot 
and two little cannon ; and refused to comply with the 
Dutch commander's summons to surrender. Upon this^ 
Ginckle directed 4 field-pieces to be brought down and 

21* 



250 THE GREEN BOOK. 

played upon the peninsula. The fire of those guns, in 
different directions, for 3 or 4 hours, producing no signs of 
submission, Ginckle found it would be necessary to incur 
the trouble and delay of a formal siege, which he was most 
solicitous to avoid. Previous to this undertaking, it was 
necessary to clear the adjoining country of any obstacle 
that might interrupt his future progress. With this view, 
he ordered a detachment to occupy an old castle, situated 
about a quarter of a mile to the south-east of the fort or 
peninsula, upon a height from which it was commanded. 
This castle was held by a small Irish outpost, consisting 
of a sergeant and 15 men. The Irish sergeant, presuming 
to think, like his superior officer at Ballymore, that a good 
soldier intrusted with the defence of a place ought not to 
surrender it exactly when his enemies may wish him to do 
so, replied to the summons of Ginckle's detachment by a 
volley which killed some of the English — for which, on the 
eventual surrender of his little post, the poor fellow, on the 
pretext of his " obstinate defence of an untenable place," 
was ordered by the Dutchman to be hanged for this brave 
discharge of his duty ! After this, the enemy occupied 
himself till about 10 o'clock at night in raising several for- 
midable batteries, mounting 14 guns and 4 mortars. The 
following morning, June 8th, at sunrise, or about half after 
3 o'clock, all those batteries, consisting of four in number, 
opened upon the fort. Towards 8 o'clock, or after about 
four hours firing, Ginckle, who from his knowledge of the 
state of the place from two prisoners taken on his march 
the day before, supposed that he had now done enough to 
overcome the stubbornness of Burke's resistance, threatened 
that officer with the fate of his sergeant if he would not give 
up the fort and surrender the garrison as " prisoners of 
war" within two hours ; adding by letter, that he would 
grant that time to the women and children of the garrison 
to leave the place, ^ on the expiration of which no further 

' Women and children were a usual " part and parcel" of every Irish 
garrison in those days. Thus, in Carrickfergus, which made such a 
spirited defence and gained such honourable conditions from Schomberg 
in August, 1689, the Irish garrison, Under Colonel Charles MacCarthy 
Moore, was accompanied by several women ; most of whom, by the 
way, were (in addition to other infamous breaches of the capitulation) 
stripped without any regard to sex or quality, and compelled to run 
the gauntlet stark naked by the northern Williamites ! — a specimen 



THE GREEN BOOK. 251 

opportunity of safety would be afforded to the besieged. 
Burke, unmoved by this personal menace, but at the same 
time obliged, on account of the bad state of his magazines, 
and in justice to so many lives under him, to listen to some 
treaty, demanded the most honourable terms, or those of 
" marching out with bag and baggage, drums beating, 
colours flying, &c." These being refused, the gallant 
governor would accept of no others ; and the women and 
children remained in the place. Ginckle then ordered all 
his great guns and mortars to open upon the fort, whose 
little works rapidly went down before the storm of cannon 
balls and bomb-shells. The Irish, amidst their falling for- 
tifications, did whatever they could with their small shot 
and two rudely mounted field-pieces to reply to this heavy 

of " no-popery" tenderness and respect for the female sex, which, if it 
would not TRENCH too much on the limits of this note, might be illus- 
trated by a modern law-church sample of similar performances to women 
in our own time. {Story, Imp. Hist. p. 10. Macpherson^s Orig. Pap. 
vol. I. p. 221.) On the surrender of Charlemont, too, in May, 1690, 
Schomberg is stated to have expressed his wonder that such a large 
number of women and children (or more than 200 to a garrison of 800 
men) should be allowed in the fort, to the great diminution of its stock 
of provisions ! The old Duke was answered, that without these com- 
panions, the Irish soldiers would not stay at all in the place ! To which 
the Duke rejoined, that " there w^as more love than policy in it !'* 
(Story, Imp. Hist, p, 62.) But this superabundance of "love" and 
dearth of " policy" in the Irish was better than any connexion with the 
" horrible traditions" preserved to the present day amongst our peasantry, 
particularly in the county of Limerick, w^ith respect to the " loathsome 
vices" of which both the " officers and soldiers" of William's reformed 
army were guilty — traditions substantiated by the letter of Dr. Gorge, 
secretary to Schomberg, in which, contrasting the infamous maxims and 
practises of that so-called reformed army with the excellent conduct of 
the Irish, the Doctor observes, — " Can we expect Sodom to destroy Ba- 
bylon, or debauchery to destroy Popery]" {Curry ^ vol. ii. p. 380. 
O'DriscoU Hist. vol. ii. p. 81, 82, 139, 140, & 173.) Whatever may 
be the alleged " state of crime" among the real or aboriginal Irish, of 
whom the great mass of our people is still composed, that people, thank 
God ! have never been accused, even by a Rod ex, of those " deeds 
without a name," which have marked the self-assumed superiority of 
their neighbours in civilization and religion. To those neighbours, or 
their descendants, have we been indebted for the benefit of such im- 
provements as have occurred amongst us. The English reformed army 
and the English reformed church have shared all the honour of those 
accomplishments between them down to our own days ! " Nulla 
vestigia retrorsum^^ has hitherto been the motto of genuine Irishmen. 
The world has never heard of a iV/acAtherton or an O'Jocelyn ! 



252 THE GREEN BOOK. 

discharge of 18 pieces of artillery, till, after enduring such 
a fire for about four hours, or till 12 o'clock, their slender 
means of defence being rendered completely unequal to a 
continuation of the contest by the fall of their engineer, 
Lieutenant-Colonel Burton,' and by the deficiency or total 
consumption of their ammunition, they hung out a signal 
of surrender. Ginckle, who, as a generous enemy, should 
have honoured the bravery of their resistance, had, on the 
contrary, the unmanly barbarity to disregard this signal, 
directinof his batteries to continue their fire under such cir- 
cumstances — or, in other words, directing his gunners to go 
on with a wanton destruction of brave men, offering to sur- 
render when destitute of the means of defence, and even to 
prolong such artillery practice, at the risk if not to the cer- 
fainty of killing and wounding a number of inoffensive 
women and children,, whom he knew to be in the place ! 
At last, at 7 in the evening, two breaches being effected, 
and a body of men embarked in four large boats to attack 
the peninsula in a quarter completely open, the Irish garri- 
son hung out their flag again ; the firing (on the only side 
that could fire !) was ordered to cease ; the governor and 
some officers coming out gave up the place at about 8 o'clock ; 
and Ginckle, who after such conduct on his part to the Irish 
sergeant and garrison, is coolly styled by Story, ''a very 
merciful man," was graciously pleased not to hang Lieu- 
tenant-Colonel Burke for doing his duty, and was likewise 
so very compassionate as not to order the indiscriminate 
slaughter in cold blood of all the inmates of the fort, who, 
after the loss of 40 of their number in the attack, and the 
departure of those who accompanied the governor, amounted 
to 51 officers, 780 soldiers, 260 Rapparees, and nearly 400 
women and children! The English reckon their loss at 
but 8 men; an assertion, if true, sufficiently proving how 
very badly the Irish garrison were supplied with the mili- 
tary means for a serious resistance. There were in the 
fort, besides the two cannon already mentioned, 430 sheep, 
40 cows, 50 horses, and a quantity of oatmeal, hut no pow- 
der ! This last apparently trifling but important fact, au- 

' Story says, or has been made by his printer to say, that the Irish 
engineer's " hand'" was shot ofT; while Harris, writing from the London 
Gazette, No. 2671, says that the engineer's "^eac?" was the suflerer ! 
Either of those shots would deprive the Irish of his services. Utrum 
horum mavis, accipe! 



THE GREEN BOOK. 253 

thenticated by Dalrymple from the MS. Memoirs of Major 
General Mackay, who was present at the siege, ^ is unfairly 
passed over by Story as placing the resistance of the Irish 
garrison in a true or creditable light, by demonstrating to 
what an unavoidable cause their surrender was owing, and 
as being calculated to make a reader estimate what sort of 
" a very merciful man"" Ginckle could be, who, in addition 
to his hanging exploit already described, could prolong the 
discharge of 18 pieces of artillery, from 12 to 7 o'clock, 

' Mackay ap. Dalrymple, vol. iii. p. 153. 

2 Story, Cont. Hist. p. 86—91. Harris, p. 318. The officers of the 
garrison were removed to Dublin and kept prisoners there; but the 
treatment of their men was shocking. They were all shipped over to 
the desert Isle of Lambay, " in the sea near Dublin, where," says the 
conscientious and pious Lesley, ^^ their allowance for touh bays mis^kf, 
without excess, be eaten at a meal, and being thus out of the reach of 
their friends, (all persons being prohibited to pass into it with boat or 
other vessel, under the penalty of forfeiting the same,) they died there 
MISERABLY and IX HEAPS !" {Lcsky ap. Curry, hook x. chap, 19, voL 
II. p. 201.) This reminds one of Diodorus Siculus's account of the ex- 
posure and destruction by famine of some miserable mercenaries, in a 
desert island, by order of the Carthaginian senate, {Diodorus, lib. y. cap, 
XI. torn. I. p. 338 & 9 — edit. Wesseling,-) of the equally barbarous 
treatment of their French prisoners, in the last Peninsular war, by the 
Spaniards, (Jones's Cont. of Hume and Srnollet, vol. iy. p. 255, 58, & 
59 ;) and of similarly abominable conduct by the English to the Ameri- 
can prisoners in New York, in 1776 & 7, to make them fight against their 
country ! — the unfortunate men, like the Irish garrison of Cork already 
mentioned, being exposed in churches, &c. without any fire — being 
often whole days without food, which, when offered, " was but a mise- 
rable pittance, damaged and loathsome" — so that "many died of hunger 
and more of diseases" — and, even when an exchange was afterwards 
agreed upon, and the treatment of these rebels (as they were called) had 
been somewhat bettered, in consequence of Washington's " victories,'" 
and ''threats of retaliation'' (the only effectual means of eliciting Eng- 
lish humanity!) ''many," says the Honourable Salma Hale, "when 
attempting to walk from their places of confinement to the vessels pro- 
vided to carry them away, fell and expired !" (Hist. United States, 
chap. XIX. p. 276 & 7.) English mercy is indeed well worthy of being 
associated with Carthaginian and Spanish humanity ! For a descrip- 
tion of the dishonourable trickery, if not virtual perjury, through which 
the survivors of this cruel imprisonment in Lambay^were finally cheated 
by William's Lords Justices out of the privilege of being conveyed free 
of cost to France, at the end of the war, by virtue of the Articles of Li- 
merick, see Harris, p. 351. Some English writer, I think Dr. Johnson, 
says, that " English vengeance wars not with the dead .'"—but pray 
WHEN has it ever spared the living ? 



m 



254 THE GREEN BOOK. 

against a place under the indefensible circumstances above 
mentioned ! 

This resistance of Ballymore, though so much shorter, 
from the want of proper supplies, than it would otherwise 
have been, and though purchased with the loss of a regiment 
of good troops, besides irregulars, was, nevertheless, of the 
greatest service to the Irish. Had that outpost surrendered 
to the enemy immediately on his appearance before it, and 
had he, in consequence, been able, after merely throwing a 
garrison into it, to advance straight to Athlone, he must 
have taken that important place and crossed the Shannon 
at once ; the Irish army being still, from the bad conduct 
of France, so little prepared for the campaign, that, even 
for a considerable time after Ginckle would have arrived on 
the banks of the Shannon, no Irish force was ready at Ath- 
lone, at all capable of preserving it.^ The delay occasioned 
to Ginckle by the necessity under which he was placed of 
repairing and strengthening the fortifications of Ballymore, 
which Burke's defence had compelled him to batter down, 
occupied the Dutch commander from the 10th to the 17th 
of June. By that time, naving put Ballymore into such a 
condition as would serve for the protection of the small de- 
tacliment he intended to station there, he gave the command 
of the place to Lieutenant-Colonel Toby Purcell, with but 
four companies of foot or no more than 240 men, exclusive 
of officers — it being so much his object to bring as great a 
force as possible against the Irish, that, according to the 
observation of Major General Mackay, he even neglected 
to establish sufficient magazines and places of communica- 
tion in his rear. 2 

On the 18th of June, the main army, from which some 
reconnoitering parties of horse and foot had been sent out 
as early as the 16th and 17th in the direction of Lanesbo- 
rough and Athlone, marched towards the latter place, and, 
'5 miles from it, were joined at Ballyburn pass, by 7,000 
foreign mercenaries under the Duke of Wirtemberg and 
Count Nassau. This important reinforcement added to 
Ginckle's previous force of between 15 and 16,000 men, 
exclusive of Mackay's troops, would make the English army 
between 22 and 23,000 men, though nearer the latter num- 

^ King James, vol. ii. p. 452 & 3. 

2 Mackay ap. Dairy mple, vol. iii. p. 153. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 255 

ber than the former ; and, reckoning Mackay's contingent, 
on the moderate grounds already advanced, at but 2,000 
troops, the Dutch General would have at his command, for 
the attack on Athlone, a force amounting, with gunners, &c., 
to at least 25,000 strong.^ 

The ancient town of Athlone is situated about the centre 
of Ireland, partly in Roscommon and partly in Westmeath, 
in a territory formerly called O'Kelly's country.^ Like 

1 Story, Cont. Hist. p. 91—94. Harris, p. 318 and 19. Story's 
English brass or lead in making Ginckle's army only ^' about 18,000, is 
really amusing : and Harris's still greater display of those metals, in 
copying the same statement, though he mentions the junction of Mac- 
kay's force which Story slides over, is even much v^orse. 

2 Story, Imp. Hist. p. 101, &:c. He states it to have been Queen 
Elizabeth's intention to make Athlone the seat of her Lords Justices 
of Ireland, from its being in the centre of the island ; with which idea 
compare the remarks in note 2, p. 191, respecting the bad military situ- 
ation of Dublin for a national metropolis. The present or modern Irish 
appellation of x\thlone is Blahluin, a corrupt contraction of three old Irish 
w^ords, meaning in English, " the town of the ford of the moon,^^ to 
whom the place is thought to have been sacred in Pagan times ; several 
valuable crescents of gold, the emblems of lunar worship, having been 
discovered in a neighbouring bog, not many years ago, and sold for £858 
to a Dublin jeweller, by whom they were melted down for w^ant of a pur- 
chaser of sufficient wealth and antiquarian taste ! The ancient sept of 
the O'Kellys, in whose barony Athlone was situated, deduce their origin 
from Heremon, the son of Milesius. The heads of this old race were 
O'Kellys of Hy-Maine, or Hy-Maney, " a country comprehending," says 
the venerable Charles O'Conor, of Balenagar, " the northern parts of 
the County of Gahvay, and the southern parts of the County of Ros- 
common." The direct founder of this house, entitled Maine More, or 
the Great, settled, towards the end of the 5th century, in the district 
named after him. The chiefs or kiit^s of Hy-Maine, as they were 
called, were hereditary Treasurers of Connaught, and one of them is 
mentioned among the leading Conacian princes, who were stationed on 
the left wing of the Irish army in the memorable battle of Clontarf, (A. 
D. 1014,) and who contributed with their lives to achieve that glorious 
victory over the political and religious enemies of their country ! This 
powerful clan extended its conquests from Hy-Maine beyond the river 
Suck, in Roscommon, and was subdivided into several distinguished 
branches. The chief of these were the O'Kellys of Aughrim, (who 
lost their property where their country lost her last battle,) and those of 
Gallagh and Mullagh in the county of Galway, " ubi," says the pious, 
profound, and patriotic De Burgo, " sicut in Roscomaniensi, atque alibi 
in Conacia, baud modica latifundia possident." He likewise remarks of 
the anti-malthusian propensities of this genuine Irish race, that, in Ire- 
land, " ne vix quidem pagum, aut villulam reperire est, ubi KelHus ali- 
quis non adest !" Many brave officers bearing the appellation of O'Kelly 



256 THE GREEN BOOK. ^ 

Limerick and other towns in Ireland at this period, Athlone 
consisted of two divisions entitled the Irish and English 
towns. The former lay on the western or Connaught, and 
the latter on the eastern or Leinster side of the Shannon ; 
and, about the middle of the fortress, (speaking of it as in- 
cluding both towns,) the passage of the stream from one to 
the other was crossed by a bridge where the river was nar- 
rowest. On the approach of Lieutenant General Douglas, 
the ^ preceding year, the Irish Governor, Colonel Richard 
Grace, believing the English town to be untenable, had 
burned the houses and evacuated it ; contenting himself 
with the defence of the Irish town, from which he repulsed 
the enemy. It had now, on the contrary, been resolved 
to contest both sides of the river with Ginckle, and 
the walls of the English town, which Douglas, in his 
precipitate retreat last year, had omitted to level, were re- 
paired as well as circumstances would permit. Those walls, 
how^ever, were of no great streno; th aorainst such an immense 
park of artillery as the enemy's ; and, when it Avas known, on 
the morning of the 19th of June, that the whole of Ginckle's 
large and well-appointed force was actually approaching the 
place, the situation of the Irish Governor, Colonel Fitzgerald, 
was extremely critical and embarrassing. From the unfi- 
nished state of the Irish preparations, already adverted to, 
only a small party or advanced post of cavalry belonging to 
St. Ruth's army had yet come up ; for the description of 
service required at Athlone, or garrison duty, and from 
the nature of the grounds in the vicinity of the place, in- 
fantry and not cavalry could be of use, even if the cavalry 
that had reached the town were of any considerable amount, 
which they were not ; the large army of the enemy, unless 
retarded in its approaches, would consequendy be able to 
make itself master of the place, before any accession of 

distinguished themselves in the French and Austrian services during the 
last century ; in the battle of Waterloo, also, an O'Kelly represented the 
" British heart and the British arm" in a style that several of IVapoleon's 
cuirassiers are not alive to describe ; and, " though last," assuredly " not 
least," no Milesian name has contributed more ornaments to the Irish 
CathoUc Church — that great and influential depositary of high national, 
as well as true religious, feeling — that firm granite column of Irish patri- 
otism, as well as Irish piety ! {Mason^s Statistical and Parochial Sur- 
vey of Ireland, vol, iii. p. 45 and 46. MacGeoghegan, vol. i. p. 320. 
P'Halloran, book xi. chap. 8. O'Conor^s Dissertation, p. 237. Hi- 
hernia Dom,inicana^ p, 235, and 779. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 257 

Strength to the Irish garrison could arrive ; and yet, while it 
tvas so absolutely necessary to delay the enemy's advance, 
the number of Irish troops in the English town was so very 
small, or not above 3 or 400 altogether, that an attempt of 
such a mere handful of men to issue from their fortifications, 
for the purpose of arresting the progress to the walls of a 
veteran army, 25,000 strong, appeared to be a rash or 
hopeless enterprise. Nevertheless, as several bogs, woods, 
and other intricacies of the ground leading to the town, ap- 
peared to present some convenient opportunities for making 
an attempt to disturb the enemy's march. Colonel Fitzgerald 
sent out a party of Irish grenadiers to dispute the passes 
and defiles with the hostile forces. The grenadiers per- 
formed this delicate and important task with equal courage 
and prudence — keeping the masses of the enemy in check 
as long as possible, and, while retiring before his superior 
numbers, making him purchase his advance at the cost of a 
considerable number of men ! The English camp was but 
5 miles from Athlone, and the troops are mentioned by their 
own historian to have moved from their quarters ''very 
early" on the morning of the 19th of June, — a time of the 
year when it is daylight at 3 o'clock — yei so ably was 
their progress disputed by the gallantry and skill of this little 
outpost of Irish grenadiers, that the garrison were not driven 
from their last position beyond the walls, and confined 
within the fortifications of the town on the Leinster side, 
till 9 o'clock ! 

Ginckle, though nearly the whole of his immense batter- 
ing train had yet to come up, resolved to lose no time in 
attacking the English town. He first planted 3 guns against 
a breast-work which the Irish had constructed on the western 
bank of the Shannon, to guard a ford over the river, above 
the town, upon the northern or Lanesborough side. These 
3 guns fired upon the Irish breast-work, the whole day. 
About 6 in the evening, a second battery was raised between 
Isker and Athlone, and, by hard working that night, at 8 in 
the morning of the 20th of June, a third battery of 9 eigh teen- 
pounders was ready. The heavy guns being then ordered 
to play with vigour upon a bastion by the river side near 
the Dublin Gate, a breach was made in the "slender wall" 
by 12 o'clock ; and the fire being so strong and incessant 
as to prevent the small garrison within from raising any 
works to repair or counteract the damage done by the Eng- 

22 



258 THE GREEN BOOK. 

lish artillery without, an assault was ordered at 5 o'clock. 
The enemy's storming party consisted of a strong detach- 
ment of infantry, sustained by a considerable body of horse. 
It was formed of 4000 Dutch, Danish, English, and other 
troops, all fresh and vigorous men, selected for the purpose 
— the operations of the siege from its commencement hav- 
ing been carried on by successive detachments from the 
enemy's main army that relieved one another at proper in- 
tervals, so that, where there were so many troops, none 
w^ere overworked. The Irish, on the contrary, beside the 
w^eakness of the breach they had to defend, were, as has 
been seen, but 3 or 400 in number, and, as no fresh troops 
had come up to their relief, they were exhausted with 48 
hours' continual action ! Nevertheless, they withstood the 
enormous numerical superiority of the enemy with great 
spirit for some time, not giving ground till at least 200 of 
their little party were killed and wounded ; and when eventu- 
ally forced by such a severe diminution of their small num- 
ber to retire, they made their way to the bridge, w^hich led 
over the Shannon into the Irish half of the fortress. There, 
or in front of the bridge, they bravely kept the whole power 
of Ginckle's force at bay, till they cut off the enemy's ac- 
cess to the western or Connaught side of the river by break- 
ing down 2 arches of the bridge; and then, with some fur- 
ther loss in gaining the draw-bridge, the remnant of this 
gallant litde band succeeded in retiring from the English 
town, which they so obstinately defended, into the Irish 
town, which they thus so nobly preserved ! The only tro- 
phies of any consequence claimed from this unequal contest 
were one prisoner, a French Lieutenant Colonel, who was 
found disabled, amidst the slain under the bridge, about 2 
days subsequent to the attack, and one pair of colours, like- 
vjise fowid in the same place, under the dead, 4 days after. 
For this last acquisition, Ginckle is mentioned to have pre- 
sented the finder with 5 guineas. It appears, on this oc- 
casion, to have been easier to find a prisoner and a pair of 
colours, than to take them !* 

' Story, Cont. Hist. p. 94—100. Harris, p. 319. King James, vol. ii. 
p. 453. To the royal author alone are we indebted for a correct know- 
ledge of the situation of the Irish in Athlone, or an acquaintance with 
the glorious fact for Colonel Fitzgerald and his few brave companions 
there, that St. Ruth's army did not reach the place till after the capture 
of the English town. This very important circumstance Story and Har- 



THE GREEN BOOK. 259 

The conduct of these few hundred Irish troops, during 
those two days, exceeds any powers of eulogy to do it jus- 
tice. What never-ending tirades we would be stunned with, 
about the ''matchless bravery of the British lion," ''the 
stubborn courage of the English bull-dog," &c. if only 3 or 
400 real or native English representatives of the ''British 
heart and the British arm" had, under the circumstances 
of this little Irish garrison, ever contested one and preserved 
ANOTHER place so gloriously as they did, against 25,000 
veterans, and such an artillery as Ginckle's ! ' 

ris appear either to have deliberately passed over, or to have been com- 
pletely ignorant of. And yet it has hitherto been from such one-sided 
authorities as these, that our Irish histories of those and other times have 
generally been written ! 

' When Ireland is " as she ought to be," or when Catholics, Protest- 
ants, and Presbyterians shall consider that they are only three leaves be- 
longing to ONE shamrock — an event much nearer than some people 
think, and one which, at all events, must ultimately take place! — Colo- 
nel Fitzgerald and his brave companions ought to have a splendid "na- 
tional testimonial" (of the right sort!) erected to them in the English 
town of Athlone, and in front of the bridge which they so nobly defended 
— upon the 4 sides of which monument some inscription like the follow- 
ing should be engraved, in the English, Irish, French and Latin Ian- 
Be it remembered, 
that 
On the I9th and 20th of June, 1691, 
A little band of 
Between 3 and 400 Irishmen,* 
under 
Colonel Fitzgerald, 
Contested against an EngUsh army of 25,000 men, 
under 
Lieutenant General Ginckle, 
The passes leading to and the English town 

of 

Athlone ! 

And, though the place had but a "slender wall," 

In which 

The enemy's well-appointed and superior artillery 

Soon made a large breach, 

And, though its few defenders were worn down 

By 48 hours' continual exertion, 

They held out 

Till the evening of the second day ! 

When, 

The breach being assaulted, 

by 



260 THE GREEN BOOK. 

This stout defence of the English town completely 
realized the object for which it was so gallantly made, by 
enabling the Irish main army, under St. Ruth, to arrive in 
time to guard the Irish town and the passage of the Shan- 
non — though, could that army have come up but 2 days 
before, it would have deprived the enemy of the important 
advantage he had enjoyed, in having only had to deal with 
Colonel Fitzgerald's feeble outpost, instead of the entire 
military strength of the Irish, whose opposition must have 
cost Ginckle a much greater, if not an absolutely ruinouSj^ 
loss, in contesting the passes to and in attacking the Eng- 

A fresh body of 4,000 Dutch, Danish and English troops, 

Selected from 25,000 men, who fought in 

Successive detachments 

Against but 3 or 400, with no fresh troops to reHeve them, 

These " gallant few" 

Did not abandon the breach before 

Above 200 of their number were killed or disabled ! 

Then, 

In spite of the enemy, the brave survivors 

Made their way to the bridge 

Over the Shannon, 

Maintained themselves in front of it 

Till they demolished 2 arches behind them, 

and 

Finally retired across the river by a draw-bridge into 

The Irish town, 

Which was thus preserved by their heroism 

Till the coming up, soon after, 

of 

The Irish main army, 

under 

Lieutenant General St. Ruth ! 



Reader, 

If thou art a stranger, 

Admire and venerate the memory of this little band 

and 

Their gallant leader ! 

If thou art 

An Irishman, 

Not only admire and venerate those who 

Shed their blood for Ireland, 

But 

Be prepared, 

If necessary, 

To 

"Go and do likewise I" 



THE GREEN BOOK. 261 

iish town, than he had suffered, in consequence of the very 
weak condition in which he had found them. On the 
evening of the 20th of June, just as the English town was 
taken, St. Ruth appeared with his forces on the Connaught 
side of the Shannon, and, encamping a litde behind the 
Irish town, made arrangements to put a stop to the enemy's 
further progress. On the other hand, Ginckle, without 
allowing any intermission of exertion to his army after their 
late success, commenced his operations, the same evening, 
for attacking the Irish town. The 3 guns, with w^hich he 
had cannonaded the Irish breast-work towards Lanes- 
borouo^h, were brouorht into the Eno^lish town, alono^ with 
the 9 eighteen pounders, which had battered down the bas- 
tion near the Dublin Gate. The next day, June 21st, a 
detachment of cavalry, under Colonel Wolseley, was de- 
spatched towards Ballymore to hasten up a number of pon- 
toons for the passage of the river, and to guard 11 cannon 
and 3 mortars which were on the road ; and, against even- 
ing, a battery was completed to the right or north-east of 
the bridge, for 5 twenty-four pounders, and a floor finished 
for 6 mortars. These 11 guns and 3 mortars, together with 
the 12 guns, just mentioned as having been brought from 
beyond the walls into the English town, make a total of 26 
pieces of battering artillery, all except 3, (whose sizes are 
not specified, but which were probably mortars, and, as 
such, large,) being of very great weight of metal. 

These dispositions for attacking the Irish town being 
completed early on the morning of the 22d, at 6 o'clock the 
English batteries opened upon the citadel or Castle of 
Athlone, w^hich, as it was so situated in the Irish town that 
its fire commanded the passage of the bridge over the Shan- 
non, it was first necessary to destroy, before any attempt 
could be made to enter the Irish town by the bridge. The 
Casde was a fortress of considerable strength, the walls of 
which Colonel Grace had last year lined with ''18 feet thick 
of earth," so that Douglas's artillery made litde or no im- 
pression upon the place. But, it had now to withstand the 
incessant and ponderous discharges of Ginckle's far more 
numerous and ethcient train, directed by the veteran skill 
and experience of foreign officers, who had acquired the 
knowledge of their profession at the great sieges of the 
Continent, in an age when the science of military engineer- 
ing was carried to such a brilliant height by the rival abib'- 

22^ 



262 THE GREEN BOOK. 

ties of a Vauban and a Coehorn. The fire of the besiegers 
was directed against the north-eastern or weakest part of the 
Castle ; by 7 in the evening a large breach was made in the 
wall, and the English great guns and mortars continuing to 
blaze away without any interruption, even during the nighty 
by 5 in the morning of the 23d of June an entire side of the 
Castle gave way before the hostile cannon-balls and bomb- 
shells. A fortified mill upon the bridge, in which 64 Irish 
soldiers were stationed, was also wrapped in flames by the 
enemy's grenades, and the garrison, with the exception of 
2 men who saved their lives by leaping into the river, being 
neither able to get out of the building nor to quench the 
conflagration, were unhappily involved in the destruction 
of the place. Next day, or on the 24th, more heavy ord* 
nance continuing to arrive, 3 additional batteries were con- 
structed against the Irish town, " one below the bridge, 
another above it, and a third without the town walls by the 
river side," over against a bastion erected by the Irish on 
the Connaught bank of the river. Meanwhile, notwith- 
standing the immense superiority and powerful effect of the 
English artillery in demolishing the fortifications of the 
Irish town, Ginckle, finding from the spirit and resolution 
of the Irish defence, and from the nature of the place, that 
it w^ould be more prudent to endeavour to pass the river by 
some sort of a diversion or flanking movement, than by 
merely limiting himself to a direct attempt to cross the 
bridge by force, had formed a plan to gain the opposite 
bank by means of pontoons, below the ford, or towards the 
side of Athlone in the direction of Banagher, and had like- 
wise resolved upon making another attempt, in the opposite 
direction of Lanesborough. New ''tin boats, floats and 
other materials" for the former of those enterprises had 
arrived in the camp from England on the 23d, escorted by 
a reinforcement of Lord Oxford's and Colonel Byerley's 
regiments of horse ; but, as less of those articles than were 
expected Avere sent, other boats that were in Ireland had to 
be put in order, to complete the requisite number. During 
these repairs, Ginckle proceeded with his design of crossingf 
towards Lanesborough, where he was informed, that ''there 
might be an easy and undiscovered passage for most of his 
army, whilst his cannon amused the Irish at the town!" 
For this purpose, the day he ordered the 3 additional bat- 
teries already mentioned to be mounted, he sent out a Lieu- 



THE GREEN BOOK. 263 

tenant with a party of horse to examine the ford, which was 
found to be practicable. But Brigadier Wauchop, Governor 
of the Castle of Athlone, having gained early intelligence 
of this design, gave immediate warning of it to Colonel 
Edmund Bui O'Reilly, Governor of Lanesborough, direct- 
ing him, in case of any danger, to send for the Earl of An- 
trim's regiment, which was ready to advance at the first 
signal on Lanesborough, and drive the English into the 
river. Colonel O'Reilly accordingly threw up strong works 
upon the only accessible part of the bank on the Connaught 
side, and Ginckle's idea of passing over there had, in con- 
sequence, to be abandoned !^ 

1 Story, Cont. Hist. p. 98—101. Rawdon Papers, p. 327. Dal- 
rymple, vol. iii. p. 153 & 4. Harris, p. 319, &c. Brigadier or Major 
General John Wauchop, whose notice to Colonel O'Reilly prevented 
Ginckle's passage of the Shannon at Lanesborough, was zs^gt an Irish 
but a Scotch officer ; a circumstance which I am the more careful to 
particularize, from my hatred of any nation's either directly or indirectly 
pluming itself upon the merits of another, after the English Union mode, 
or "^riVisA-heart-and-^/^V/s/i-arm" style ! Wauchop, (likewise spelled 
Wacop and Wahup,) whose name appears to the Depositions of King 
James's General Officers from Derry, and also to the Articles of Lime- 
rick, distinguished himself in Ireland, like Major General Thomas Bu- 

chan. Colonel Ramsay, Brigadier Thomas Maxwell, and others of 

his countrymen. There were 2 Wauchops in James's army, John, the 
Brigadier and Major General above mentioned, and Francis, a Lieute- 
nant Colonel in the Queen's Regiment of Infantry. The Brigadier and 
Colonel Edmund Bui O'Reilly had previously served together at Cavan 
in the winter of 1689-90, particularly in the battle of Tullagh-Mangaia 
hill, just above the town, fought on the 13th of February, 1690, between 
the Duke of Berwick and Colonel Wolseley. Colonel Edmund Bui, 
more properly written Buidhe O'Reilly, — or Edmund O'Reilly the 
yellow, — was the head of the old and powerful house of O'Reilly, de- 
scended, like their neighbours the O'Rourkes, from Heremon, son of 
Milesius, through Con of the Hundred Battles, monarch of Ireland in 
the 2d century, and princes of East Brefny, or the modern County of 
Cavan, as the O'Rourkes were of West Brefny, or the modern County of 
Leitrim. The O'Reillys, like others of the Milesian, or genuine and 
ancient, as opposed to the modern, or merely nomirial and titular nobi- 
lity of Ulster, were stripped of the greater part of the large possessions 
of their clan from time immemorial, in the year 1607, by means of one 
of those pretended rebellions to which the ''''figure and fortune^^ of so 
many who now hold a high head can be, and are, traced ! — Tullagh 
Mangain hill, on which the Duke of Berwick had a horse shot under 
him in the action against Colonel Wolseley, and which is now called 
the Gallows Hill, from its having been made the site of the execution of 
malefactors, out of spite and hatred to the O'Reillys, by the mushroom 
usurpers who ejected and robbed them, is the place upon which the 



264 THE GREEN BOOK. 

The dangerous attempt to cross by force at the bridge 
had therefore to be resumed, though the Irish, after this 
success in baffling the enemy, displayed as much activity in 
resisting the English at Athlone, as they had shown vigi- 

0''Reilly, or the head of his race, was once proclaimed chief of that tribe 
and its territory, as I have been informed by a learned friend, a native 
of that district, and a worthy member of the old and honourable sept 
whose name he bears. The ceremony of inauguration, according to 
tradition and the general custom in Ireland, took place in the open air, 
on an ancient stone seat ; and it was precisely over the spot upon which 
that venerable relic of antiquity stood, that the mean malignity and 
bigoted vandalism of those upstart intruders, above alluded to, erected the 
gallows, after breaking the chair of the old chieftains to pieces ! This 
circumstance is pathetically alluded to by the hereditary chief poet of the 
O'Reillys, Maurice O'Daly, who flourished about 1630, in a poem in 
praise of Tullagh Mangain hill, giving a list of all the princes of East 
Brefny to his own time, and commencing, ^^Alas, that thou art thus, 
uk hill/" According to the accurate and extensive traditional informa- 
tion of the late Mr. WilHam Stuart of Cavan, who died in 1837, aged 
90, and who was the grandson of a person who came to Cavan in Colo- 
nel Wolseley's dragoons, Colonel Edmund Bui O'Reilly was the son of 
Colonel Philip O'Reilly, of Ballynacargy Castle, who commanded the 
troops of the Irish Catholics, or Confederates of Kilkenny, in Cavan, in 
the reign of Charles I. Besides Colonel Edmund Bui, who was leader 
of a regiment of infantry, Governor of Cavan at the time of Wolseley's 
attack, and afterwards Governor of Lanesborough when Ginckle was 
checked there, several other O'Reillys, or Reillys, were in King James's 
army; namely, Colonel John O'Reilly, commander of a regiment of 
Irish dragoons, Major Reilly and Captain Reilly, both killed in the battle 
of Cavan, and Lieutenant Colonel Luke Reilly. At that period, also, 
Father Edmund Reilly was one of the Royal Chaplains, who came over 
with James II. from France ; Hugh Reilly, Esq. of Lara, author of 
'''Ireland's Case briefly stated,''' was a Master in Chancery ; on the 
27th of x\ugust, 1689, was made Clerk of the Privy Council ; and, if 
the King were restored, would have been his actual, as he was his titu- 
lar, Lord Chancellor of Ireland. He was also member in the Irish Par- 
hament of 1689, along with Philip Oge O'Reilly, Esq. for the Borough 
of Cavan — while the County of Cavan was represented in the same 
assembly by Philip Reilly of Aghnicrery and John Reilly of Garryro- 
buck, Esquires. Colonel Edmund Bui, who had raised 2 regiments, or 
1 of foot and 1 of dragoons, for King James, retired to France with the 
Irish army after the surrender of Limerick. The regiment of dragoons 
having been broken up in Ireland, that officer brought to France his 
regiment of infantry ; but it having been embodied with others, he " re- 
mained," says MacGeoghegan, " without any regiment," and " his grand- 
son, a captain in the regiment of Dillon," in the Brigade, " was consi- 
dered chief of the O'Reillys." I am only acquainted with the ultimate 
fate of this ancient and noble line through the following anecdote related 
by Walker, the historian of the Irish bards, in 1787. " x\n old lady, 
now living in the County of W^estmeath," says that agreeable writer, 



THE GREEN BOOK. 265 

lance in foiling them at Lanesborough. That night, they 
raised 2 batteries of 6 guns above the Castle — one of 3 six- 
pounders close by the river, and another of the same num- 
ber farther off upon an eminence. Next day, or on the 
25th, these 2 Irish batteries played upon the enemy's 
quarters ; the latter upon a portion of the walls of the Eng- 
lish town by which part of Ginckle's force was sheltered, 
and the former upon some English regiments posted near 
the river. The first 3 guns had not much effect upon the 
walls ; but the other 3, pouring their shot into the midst of 
the English regiments, obliged them to shift their quarters 
to a less dangerous position. Ginckle, on the other hand, 
from a battery of 6 twenty-pounders planted below the 
bridge, did great injury to a breast-work of the Irish, de- 
stroyed the greater part of the houses yet standing in the 
Irish town, and so exposed the rest of the hostile works to 
view, as to force the Irish to quit most of their trenches, 
except such as were behind the Castle. On the 26th, 30 
wagon-loads of powder arrived in the English camp ; no 
less than 7 batteries now continued to fire the whole day 
upon the Irish works, and " all night," says the English an- 
nalist and eye-witness, '*our guns and mortars play most 

"remembers to have once fallen, during her infancy, into the company 
of Madam O'Reilly, commonly called the Countess of Cavan, the last 
of that unfortunate house. The only part of the dress of this venerable 
dame that made an impression on the infant mind of my informant, was 
her train, of which the length was so considerable as to spread incom- 
modiously across the drawing-room" — according to the fashion of the 
old Irish families of rank, among whom that courtly appendage was 
upheld by a page. " One of the company happening to step incau- 
tiously on the end of it, the old lady turned and said, with a heavy sigh, 
Alas ! /once had a page to hear up my train /" Many flourishing 
off-shoots of the race of O'Reilly have, however, survived in the Counties 
of Cavan and Meath, as the learned De Burgo observed in 1752, all of 
whom were, as he says, ^^Catholicd religione clari ;^' and, I need hardly 
add, that from the name of O'Reilly, as well as O'Kelly, the Irish Ca- 
thohc hierarchy, in particular, can boast of several of its best supporters 
and most distinguished ornaments. (^Berwick^s Memoirs, vol. i. p. 52, 
55, 56, 66, 67 4" QS— Paris edit. 1778. Harris, p. 248, Sr Appendix, 
p. Ixxiv. Macpherson^s Stuart Papers, vol. i. p. 216. Hihernia Do- 
'minicana,p. 285, 286, c^ 790. Trans. lb. Celt. Soc. p. xcii., cii., ciii., 
cxiii-xiv., clxiv., clxxxiii-v-vi. King's State of the Protestants of Ire- 
land, Appendix, p. 67, 89, Sf 92. Story, Imp. Hist. p. 53, 54, 55 Sf 
Cont. Hist. p. 13, 14, 6f 30. Harris's Ware, vol. ii. p. 252 4* 3. 
MacGeoghegan, vol. i. p. 318, 4" vol. in. p. 468 4" 9* Walker's Essay 
on Irish Dress, p. 50, 1st edit. <SfC» <SfC.) 



266 THE GREEN BOOK. 

furiously !" On the 27th, a nev/ or 8th battery of 5 pieces 
was planted in a meadow below the English town, to rake 
the passage, and thus interrupt the communication between 
the Irish camp and the Irish town; 100 cart-loads of can- 
non-balls also came from Dublin; and, on that day, as well 
as the former, the English " guns and mortars fired without 
intermission !" Amidst the incessant blaze and roar and 
destruction from so many pieces of heavy artillery, whose 
vivid light, in the fine, short, and warm nights of June, 
rendered every discharge of ball from the cannon, and of 
bombs and stones from the mortars, as precise and fatal as 
by day, the spirit and gallantry of the Irish defence could 
not be surpassed. 

A correspondent from Ginckle's army, describing the 
formidable state of the English works, says, '^we can now 
stand almost at the waters edge and look ot'e?%" yet, he 
adds, "the enemy work like horses in carrying fascines to 
Jill the trenches /" And, to cite the more expressive ac- 
count of another spectator, Colonel Felix O'Neill, writing 
from the Irish Camp — though the enemy " raised their 
batteries so high that a cat could scarce appear with- 
out BEING KNOCKED IN THE HEAD BY GREAT OR SMALL SHOT 

the French Generals acknowledged they never 

SAW more resolution and firmness in any men OF any 
NATION ; nay, blamed the men for their forwardness, 
and cried them up for brave fellows, as intrepid as 
lions !"^ The great vigour with which Ginckle pushed on 

> Rawdon Papers, Letters cli. & clii. The first of these interesting 
private communications is dated from Ginckle's camp before Athlone, 
June 28th, 1691, and was written by a Mr. Daniel MacNeal to Sir 
Arthur Rawdon. The second is from Colonel Felix O'Neill, to the 
Countess of Antrim, to whom it was written July 10th, 1691, in the 
Irish camp at Aughrim, only two days before the battle, but never for- 
warded, having been found in the gallant Colonel's pocket, when he was 
stripped after the action, in which he was slain. Besides Sir Neal 
O'Neill and Colonel Felix, (who had also been Advocate General to 
King James,) there were various other officers of that illustrious and 
martial race in the Irish army ; namely. Colonels Gordon and Cormac 
O'Neill, Major Henry O'Neill, lieutenant Colonel Con O'Neill, and 
Brian, I think, also a Lieutenant Colonel. In the Irish ParJiament of 
May, 1689, there likewise were several O'Neills. Constantine O'Neill, 
Esq. sat for the Borough of Armagh; Cormac O'Neill, Esq. for the 
County of Antrim ; Daniel O'Neill, Esq. for the Borough of Lisburn ; 
Toole O'Neill of Dromankelly, Esq. for the Borough of Killileagh, in 
the County of Down ; Colonel Gordon O'Neill, for the County of Ty- 



THE GREEN BOOK. 267 

his approaches since the 26th, and the fury with which he 
thundered from his artillery by night as well as by day, 
proceeded from a final determination to force his way over 
the bridge at any cost, since he had now nothing to hope 
for in the direction of Lanesborough, and even if his pon- 
toons for passing at the southern or Banagher side of the 
town were ready, the Connaught bank was fortified there 
also ; the Irish, on their part, opposed this determination 
of Ginckle wdth undiminished and desperate obstinacy, 
" We labour hard," says Ginckle's historian, " to gain the 
bridge ; but what we got here was inxh by inch as it ivere^ 

the ENEMY STICKING VERY CLOSE TO IT, thoVgh GREAT NUM- 
BERS of them were slain by our guns ; and this service,'' 
he adds, ''cost lis great store of ammunition !'" The 
attack on that point was commenced by the English upon 
the 26th, the day on which they had completed their 7 
batteries ; and the struggle was gallantly maintained by the 
Irish till the evening of the 27th. By that time, Ginckle at 
length contrived to gain possession of and to cover the 2 
broken arches demolished by the brave little garrison of 
Colonel Fitzgerald f and, the same night, the English were 
enabled to work hard at the last arch of the bridge which 
the Irish had broken and had continued to contest from the 
opposite side of the river, till they were obliged to retire by 
a circumstance that rendered a longer attempt at resistance 
impossible. Their breast-works, from which an opposition 
was made to the further advance of the English, were 
mostly formed of fascines, the wood of w^hich, from the 
great warmth of the w^eather, being soon dried and easily 
inflammable, was set on fire by some of the enemy's gre- 
nades ; and, the flames spreading, the troops that guarded 
those entrenchments were consequently obliged to retire, to 
avoid being enveloped in the conflagration !^ 

rone; and Arthur O'Neill, Esq. of Ballygawley, for the Borough of 
Dungannon ! (King's State of the Protestants, p. 68, and Appendix, 
p. 68, 69, 70, 91, 92, Sf 94. MacGeoghegan, vol. in. p. 448.) And 
this even after all the O'Neills had lost by the vultures of British con- 
fiscation ! 

1 Story, Cont. Hist. p. 102. 

2 Story, Cont. Hist. p. 101. I consider those first 2 broken arches 
mentioned by Story as the same which were destroyed by Colonel Fitz- 
gerald's detachment, according to the passage of King James's narrative, 
already referred to. 

2 Story, Cont. Hist. p. 102. Harris, p. 319. 



268 THE GREEN BOOK. 

It was now Sunday morning, the 28th of June. From 
the 19th, or during 9 successive days and nights, the Eng- 
lish had been engaged in getting thus far towards the accom- 
pUshment of their attempt, to force the passage of the Shan- 
non, and become masters of this stubbornly-defended town. 
But that undertaking seemed noav on the verge of success ; 
the invaders appeared to be upon the point of obtaining in a 
few hours the end of their long labours; they enjoyed the 
prospect of spending that Sunday evening in the Irish 
town. The beams were laid over the last broken arch, the 
only material obstacle presenting itself to the eyes of the 
English between a rapid advance to the triumphant attain- 
ment of their wishes. Those beams were even partly 
planked ; and, a few more boards once placed over the 
small space yet uncovered, and the path to the long inacces- 
sible bank and town would be open ! 

But the enemy were destined to go " no farther." 
A brave dragoon Sergeant of Brigadier Maxwell's regi- 
ment, named Custume, proposed, with a party of his coun- 
trymen, to put a stop to the enemy's design of passing the 
river. The offer of the intrepid Sergeant was agreed to, 
and he dashed forward in the face of all the English works 
at the head of 10 daring companions in armour, and '' with 
courage and strength," says King James, " even beyond 
what men were thought capable of," began to pull away 
the English beams and planks, and fling them into the wa- 
ter ! A tremendous fire of great and small arms from the 
whole English line was directed upon these gallant fellows, 
who were all slain, before they could complete their des- 
perate task. Undeterred by their fate, 1 1 more then sprang 
forth to continue what remained to be done. Another 
general discharge of cannon and musketry flashed along the 
English bank of the river ! The smoke cleared away ; 9 
of the bold assailants had fallen ; only 2 were seen to sur- 
vive ; but the bridge was impassable ; they had finished 
their heroic enterprise !^ 

^ Story, Cont. Hist. p. 102, & 3. King James, vol. ii. p. 454. 
Story affirms that those 22 fine fellows were all Scotch, on the grounds 
that they all belonged to Maxwell's regiment. But, independent of 
several other arguments that might be adduced against his statement, 
the simple fact of Maxwell's having been a Scotchman is no proof that 
his regiment was entirely Scotch, since Ireland, so far from being able 
to get any Scotch troops to assist her, was obliged to send over a num- 



THE GREEN BOOK. 269 

Ginckle, thus a second time defeated in striving to cross 
the Shannon, resolved to renevi^ his approaches over the 
bridge by the more cautious method of a covered walk or 
close gallery/ and to support this new mode of attack by 
several others, in different directions. The whole of that 
day he cannonaded the Irish town with great violence — 
" as I believe never town ivas,^^ writes a spectator. " Thir- 
teen SQUADRON OF WAGON-HORSES," coutinucs the Same 
authority, ''are set out for Dublin for more ammunition," 
and ''you may imagine," he adds, "how fast we play 
them with our artillery, when our w^hole artillery is 
employed r^^ This terrific fire demolished a great part of 
the walls that had hitherto stood erect on the western bank 
of the river opposite to the English town, but w^as princi- 
pally pointed against the northern and strongest part of the 
citadel, called Connaught Tower, which, after taking much 
trouble to destroy, was finally overthrown. All the re- 
maining thatched houses in the Irish quarters were likewise 
burned by the enemy's shells ; and even the whole of the 
very inferior batteries possessed by the besieged, were 7iow 
dismounted. 3 Yet the Irish, amidst so many great disad- 
vantages, continued to repair their old trenches, and even 
to form some new ones, in a meadow opposite the last 
English battery of 5 guns, erected to rake the passage be- 
tween St. Ruth's camp and the town. In this dangerous 

ber of Irish to Scotland to assist Dundee, under Colonel Alexander Can- 
non, an Irishman, and Major General Thomas Buchan ; and, in short, 
the mere mention of such names as Lieutenant Colonel Daniel Macgen- 
nis and Major Callaghan amongst the officers of Maxwell's regiment, 
(which was one of dragoons) sufficiently shows that that regiment was 
xoT Scotch. While thus questioning the accuracy or veracity of 
Story's assertion (eagerly received or designedly invented, in my 
opinion, to deprive the Irish of the merit of one of the bravest actions in 
history,) I mention, however, what that English annalist states, unlike 
every other Irish writer, except Harris. 

' Story, Cont. Hist. p. 103. King James, vol. ii. p. 454. 

- Rawdon Papers, p. 344 & 5. 

2 Rawdon Papers, p. 345*. This fact, of the dismounting of all the 
Irish batteries, is particularly worth noting, as showing the peculiar 
bravery of the defence made after such a circumstance ; and, for that 
very reason, it is, no doubt, left unmentioned, like the want of powder 
at Ballymore, by Story, though a circumstance which, most certainly, 
ought not to have been omitted. But such despicable specimens of the 
basest of all falsehood, or negative lying, were indispensable, to make 
the Irish appear to have " fought hadly at home /" 

23 



270 THE GREEN BOOK. 

employment, they strove to screen themselves, in some de- 
gree, from the English artillery, by a stratagem which they 
had also practised elsewhere, — particularly at the siege of 
Carrickfergus, in this war. '' They got," says Story, 
whose account of the matter there, will convey a sufficient 
notion of its exercise here, — ''they got a great number of 
cattle, and drove them all as near to the top of the breach as 
they could force them to go, keeping themselves close be- 
hind them ; and this served in some measure to secure the 
breach, for several of the cattle were killed by our shot, 
and, as they fell, the Irish threw earth, stones, and wood 
upon them !'" Meantime, it having been resolved by a 
Council of War, that on the very next morning, the 29th, 
the passage of the river should be a thii^d time attempted, 
and in greater force than ever, the English pioneers, under 
the protection of their formidable artillery, were levelling 
the way, from their camp to the water-side, for the launch- 
ing of their large bridge of boats. These were to be thrown 
across the stream at a place about 1050 feet below, or to 
the south of the toicn-hridge ; and an endeavour was also 
made to ascertain if a ford, about 150 feet to the south of 
the same bridge, and between it and the bridge of boats, 
would be practicable for the passage of a detachment.^ 
'' Three Danish soldiers, under sentence of death," says 
Harris, ''were offered their pardon, if they would under- 
take to try the river. — The men readily consented, and, 
putting on armour, entered at three several places. The 
English in the trenches were ordered to fire, seemingly at 
them, but to aim over their heads, whence," he observes, 
" the hish concluded them to be deserters, and did not 
fire till they saw them returning ; when the English by 
their great and small shot obliging the Irish to lie covered, 
the men were preserved, two of them only being slightly 
wounded ; and it was discovered, that the deepest part of 
the river did not reach their breasts, the loater never hav- 
ing been knoivn so shallow in the memory of man /"^ It 
was accordingly determined that the Irish town should be 

' Story, Imp. Hist. p. 9. Rawdon Papers, p. 345. 

2 Rawdon Papers, p. 344. Harris, p. 319. 

3 Harris, p. 319, from whose engraved plan of Athlone, and a slight 
alteration of whose text, the distances and other matters are laid down. 
King James expressly says, and, with truth, as the event proves, that 
the enemy must have raised the siege, but for this opportune discovery. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 271 

assailed in three places. '' One party," in the words of 
Ginckle's historian, was "to go over the bridge ; a second 
to pass upon the floats and pontoons ; and a third detach- 
ment were to go over the ford below the bridge ; where our 
horse," he adds, " were also to pass and second the foot; 
a large breach being made on the other side for their en- 
trance!"^ A choice body of grenadiers, and other picked 
men from every regiment in the English army, were to 
head the attack, under the veteran Major General Mackay, 
the whole of whom, supplied with fifteen shots a man, 
were to be prepared, by six in the morning, behind the 
walls of the English town; **but," says the account, "with 
the greatest silence and secresie imaginable T^ Intelli- 
gence of the entire plan w^as, however, conveyed to St. 
Ruth by some deserters ; and he determined to act accord- 
ingly. 

Day appeared, and Mackay's grenadiers were at their 
post in due time. It was, however, near 10 o'clock before 
the long bridge of boats could be got ready for launching ; 
and the English had the double mortification of not only 
being obliged to defer their attack, but of perceiving that 
the Irish had been fully apprized of the attempt, and were 
taking every precaution against it ! From an early hour, 
in spite of the continued and annoying fire of the English 
batteries, detachments of St. Ruth's best troops were seen 
pouring into the Irish town to man the works. St. Ruth 
himself, with the rest of his army as a reserve, likewise 
took post immediately behind the walls of the town that 
lay towards his camp ; and was thus both guarded by those 
walls from the hostile artillery, and on the watch to pounce 
upon and overwhelm the English with his entire strength, 
in case any assistance should be required by the garrison ! 
While the French General made these excellent dispositions 
for meeting the enemy, Ginckle, as the best method of ex- 
citing the courage of his English and mercenary troops, 
distributed " handfuls of money" to the men, who were to 
attack by the bridge and ford.^ The contest was to com- 

' Story, Cont. Hist. p. 103. 

2 Story, Cont. Hist. p. 104. Harris, p. 320. Dairy mple, vol. iii. p. 
154. To Dalrymple's valuable authority, Major General Mackay, we 
are indebted for the best account of St. Ruth's arrangements, (the more 
remarkable from the subsequent fatal neglect of such precautions,) and 
for the very natural circumstance of the Dutchman's delivery of money 



272 THE GREEN BOOK. 

mence at the bridge, near the broken arch, on their own 
side of which the English had raised a breast-work. To 
this they had ahiiost advanced their gallery ; and, upon the 
attack at this point, the other operations were to depend. 
The grenadiers of both armies began by throwing tlieir 
grenades at each other, from their respective breast- works 
on the opposite sides of the broken arch ; but with very 
different results. The English did no damage to the Irish 
works, when a grenade flung across the river by one of the 
Irish grenadiers set fire to the English breast- work ! The 
whole was immediately involved in torrents of flame and 
clouds of smoke, which, from the dryness of the fascines 
or wood- work, and a westerly breeze then blowing and 
spreading the blaze on every side, it was impossible to ex- 
tinguish; so that the English were compelled to fall back, 
and form another breast-work behind their close gallery 
which was on fire, in order to preserve the remaining part 
of the bridge ! It was now past 12 o'clock ; and the assail- 
ants being equally disheartened by this repulse at the very 
outset, and intimidated by the vigorous preparations which 
St. Ruth had made to receive them, the entire attack was 
ordered to be discontinued ! Ginckle's oflicers, observes 
an eye-witness, " knew not well tcliat to think, seeing 
themselves defeated in so great a project ;^^ — w^hile "the 
troops," says Major General Mackay, "returned to their 
quarters, discovering by the sullenness and dejection of 
their looks, the passions in their minds. "^ And thus all 
the wagon-trains of powder, and cart-loads of cannon-balls, 
and " handfuls of money," were equally unsuccessful against 
this one broken portion of the bridge, which, after all the 
labour, and anxiety, and expense of a third attempt to cross 
the river, was still as impassable as ever ! 

The Irish were filled with joy at this abandonment of 
what they believed would be the last attack the enemy 
would make upon the town, and what, in fact, might, by 

to his English and mercenary, or mercenary and English followers. 
The noble verse of Timotheus, 

" Mars is the god, and Greece reveres not gold !" 

was more applicable to the Irish on this occasion, whose pay, it will be 
recollected, was but a penny a day ! 

^ Dairy mple, vol. iii. p. 154. The Scotch judge here specifically 
refers to, and may be considered as substantially quoting from, Mackay's 
MS. See also King James, vol. ii. p. 454. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 273 

due care, be rendered so, since the enemy could hardly 
succeed in another attack in the face of such obstacles as he 
himself admitted would be his destruction, by the very cir- 
cumstance of his not having dared to encounter them, after 
having made eveiy preparation for doing so. St. Ruth, 
when he beheld the English detachments retire, marched 
his own army back to his camp, where, to commemorate 
this defeat of the enemy's last and most important enter- 
prise, and to display his own conviction of the complete 
and final security of the town, he gave an entertainment to 
the ladies and gentlemen of the neighbourhood. The Irish 
soldiers, also, who mounted guard that night opposite the 
English works, from which no noise was now heard but 
the drawing away of some of the cannon, and the removal 
of such combustible materials from the trenches as appeared 
to denote a raising of the siege, evinced their exultation and 
contempt for the enemy, after their national manner, by sar- 
castically crying out to the English sentries over the river, 
in allusion to Ginckle's unavailing liberality that day, that 
"they had given bad penny-worths for the money which 
their Generals had bestowed upon them !"^ 

Ginckle was noio in a very embarrassing position. To 
stay where he was much longer was impossible, as provi- 
sions were becoming scarce, and all the forage for several 
miles round was destroyed. Only 3 measures lay open to 
his choice, to every one of which the strongest objections 
presented themselves. The 1st was another attack upon 
the town ; the 2d, a removal and attempt to pass the river 
elsewhere; and the 3d, a retreat. From the 1st, after so 
many spirited repulses by the ^rish, the very w^orst conse- 
quences were to be apprehended. The 2d, by the fact of 
its being an abandonment of the siege, would leave as little 
room for any favourable anticipations, since it would, of 
necessity, still more discourage the English than they were, 
and raise the spirits of the Irish, who, in addition to their 
late advantages in guarding the river, had last winter defeated 
several attempts to cross at Lanesborough, James-town, and 
Banagher. Besides this, any efforts of the English to pass 
either higher up, or lower down the river, would lay open 
all the adjacent counties, if not Dublin itself, to detach- 
ments of St. Ruth's army, who, getting into the rear of the 
invader, and "raising the country," (then freed from his 
^ Mackay ap. Dairy mple, vol. in. p. 156, Harris, p. 320* 

23* 



274 THE GREEN BOOK. 

presence,) would be in a capacity to intercept all supplies 
of provisions and ammunition coming from the metropolis 
and eastern coast; by which, says William's biographer, 
there would be '< no expectations of a successful campaign, 
and the utmost hopes of the English forces would be to 
wage a defensive ivar''*'^ — always ruinous to an invading 
army — " and possibly lose what they had acquired before, 
and be driven back to the north !" The 3d alternative, 
or that of a retreat, remained. But, on an expectation of 
the most speedy and decisive success, which William's 
government, upon an express assurance from Ginckle him- 
self, had publicly notified as certain, in '' but a fortnight or 
three weeks^^ after the commencement of the campaign, 
such magazines and other points of communication as were 
necessary to secure a retreat had not been established. And, 
zvhat was to be expected from such a retrograde movement, 
commenced by such a large army, 59 miles from Dublin, — 
carrying such a great and cumbrous train of artillery over 
such roads as were then in Ireland, — labouring, at its very 
first setting out, under a scarcity of provisions and forage, 
— and yet obliged to retire through a completely wasted 
territory ? — And all this in presence of a triumphant Irish 
force of above 20,000 men, that would be joined on every 
side by their countrymen, animated to the highest pitch of 
patriotic exultation and vengeance — but more particularly 
strengthened by clouds of vigilant, active, and merciless 
irregulars or Rapparees, who, aided by parties of Irish 
regular troops, especially of cavalry, in which the Irish 
strength chiefly lay, could hang upon a receding invader's 
flanks and rear, — cut off every straggler, — drive in or anti- 
cipate any detachments that might attempt to obtain subsist- 
ence or forage, — and, at the very least, compel the English, 
under such circumstances, to abandon all or nearly all of their 
great train of 47 guns and mortars, in order to hasten their 
march to where they could get any food, — if even that sacri- 
fice could rescue them from total ruin, through the com- 
bined effects of famine, fatigue, desertion, and the sword ! 

Nor were such gloomy views entertained in Ginckle's camp 
and council only. The period of " a fortnight or 3 weeks, '^ 
computed from the 30th of May, when he left Dublin to 
open the campaign, was now, by several days, elapsed. Yet, 
notwithstanding the highest abilities, exertion, and expense 
on the part of this best and last force that William could 



THE GREEN BOOK. 275 

equip, it was but too obvious that nothing of any conse- 
quence was effected. The great watery barrier and boun- 
dary of the Irish territory was as inviolate as ever ; and, in 
fine, the news of the remarkable gallantry and success with 
which the Irish had defended themselves for so many suc- 
cessive days and nights, against the long series of costly and 
persevering operations carried on by so formidable an army 
and artillery as those of the besiegers, had diffased general 
uneasiness and apprehension amongst the Anglo-Dutch or 
ascendancy faction in Ireland. In Dublin, more especially, 
the alarm had at length reached such a height, that, in anti- 
cipation of the worst results from the existing aspect of 
military affairs, the avenues of the city were barricadoed, 
and preparations made " to raise works all around it I^" Over 

• Story, Cont. Hist. p. 105. Mackay, ap. Dalrymple, vol. iii. p. 154 
& 55. Harris, p. 289, 312, 13 & 20. King James, vol. it. p. 433, 54, 
55, & 56. Berwick's Memoirs, vol. i. p. 79 & 80. The citations, here 
made, refer not merely to the facts laid down in the text, but to other 
passages tending to illustrate the truth of the opinions deduced from 
these facts. The ideas advanced respecting the probable results of a re- 
treat towards Dublin by Ginckle in his situation are, besides their con- 
sistency with reason and tactics, sufficiently countenanced by the practical 
or professional, though briefly-expressed opinions of Major-General Mac- 
kay in Dalrymple, and of the late General Keatinge, {Defence of Ireland, 
p. 24,) and may be compared b}^ the classical reader with Thucydides' 
account of the retreat, and destruction by an inferior force, of the Athe- 
nian army of 40,000 men in Sicily, after raising the siege of Syracuse ; 
although that army was ?f0T burdened in its endeavours to escape and 
reach a friendly part of the country with any thing so cumbersome 
as Ginckle's train of artillery. Leland {vol. in. p. 597) attempts to 
question Dalrymple's relation from Mackay, of the panic amongst the 
ascendancy faction in Dublin, and the consequent barricadoing, &c. of 
the place. But the Doctor's objections can only affect the mere day to 
which Dalrymple appears to have too hastily assigned the occurrence of 
those circumstances — circumstances, so natural in themselves, when as- 
sociated with the necessary recollection of Douglas's previous repulse at 
Athlone, with the marching away of all the regulars to Ginckle's army, 
with the, general inadequacy of Ginckle's efforts, by day and night, from 
the 20th to the 29th, to pass the Shannon, &c. — and, not only so natural 
in themselves from those causes, but from what we ourselves kxow of 
the precautionary apprehensions of the same faction in 1798, and even 
of the military loop-holing of the Bank or jEa;-ParUament House in 1831, 
during the Repeal agitation — said loop-holing being still as ready as ever 
tor an issue of foreign bullets, instead of native Acts of Parliament, on 
the"772ere Irish!" The guilty upholders of an anti-national dominion 
have ever evinced in their conduct a thorough sympathy with the purport 
of another usurper's exclamation, — 

" How is't with me, when every noise affrights me." — Macbeth, 



276 THE GREEN BOOK. 

such a precipice were Ginckle's army and William's power 
in Ireland now tottering, even in spite of all the ability and 
strength which England and Holland could supply, and of 
all the barbarous and impolitic neglect of Ireland by France ! 
The descriptions of Ginckle's conduct, after this third 
repulse, indicate the troubled irresolution of his mind with 
respect to his future course of action. The remainder of 
the 29th and the following day, his batteries continued to 
fire upon the Irish town ; yet the withdrawing of some of 
his cannon, and the removal of other hostile preparations 
from his trenches countenanced the opinion, general in both 
armies, that no other attack would be made, and that a retreat 
was now about to take place. ^ His perplexity was the greater, 
owing to the apprehension of being made responsible by 
William, for not publishing, before the opening of the cam- 
paign, a document intended by the king to promote an ac- 
commodation, tlirough the eligible term.s proffered to the 
Irish. ^ At length, to relieve his own anxiety by taking the 
advice of others, the Dutch commander summoned, on the 
afternoon of the 30th, a Council of W^ar, consisting of the 
Duke of Wirtemberg, the Prince of Hesse Darmstadt, the 
Dutch Count Nassau, the Danish Count Tettau, the French 
officers. Brigadier La Melloniere, Major General Ruvigny 
and Colonel Cambon, and the Scotch and English Majors 
General, Mackay and Talmash.^ After a long debate upon 
the great difficulties of their situation, (already set forth,) it 
was finally resolved, that one more attack upon the town 
would, notwithstanding the danger and difficulty of the 
attempt, be the most eligible measure at the present critical 
juncture. To render this otherwise desperate design more 
likely to succeed, it was determined to attempt it as soon as 
possible after the breaking up of the Council, and in such 
a sudden and unexpected manner as would most probably 
take the besieged completely off their guard, since the least 
apprehension on St. Ruth's part, of another attack, would 
cause him to oppose the same obstacles to any probability 
of success as he had so effectually done the day before ; and 
if the present design were not speedily acted upon, the 
French General's spies might have time to be as servicea- 
ble to him again, as they had yesterday been. Accordingly,- 

» Story, Cont. Hist. p. 104 & 5. Harris, p. 320. 

2 Mackay, ap. Dairy mple, vol. in. p. 15.5 & 6. 

3 Tindal's Rapin, vol. iii. p. 117. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 277 

the assault was to be made at 6 o'clock the same evenins", 
when the Irish would dread nothing from the circumstance 
of a double garrison being observed in the English town, as 
that was the period of relieving the guards there. ^ On the 
tolling of the church bell in the English quarters, the enter- 
prise w^as to be commenced, through the ford 150 feet below 
the bridge, by Major General Mackay, at the head of a strong 
detachment of 2,000 men, who had been particularly selected 
for, and reserved over from the attempt of the 29th ; and 
these choice troops were to be supported in the approaching 
attack by every military disposition calculated to promote 
the accomplishment of their undertaking. ^ 

While such were the designs and preparations of the 
English, St. Ruth, finding the Irish town to be so ruined 
by the enemy's artillery, and the passages so filled up with 
lumber and stones," says Colonel Felix O'Neill, '' that there 
was not room for 2 men in a breast to march any way," 
ordered all, or a good portion of the works of the place 
towards his camp, which were only made of earth, to be 
thrown down by the French engineers, directing them, at 
the same time, to confine their precautions of defence to the 
trench next the river, which was to be so formed, in con- 
nexion with the destruction of the fortifications alluded to, 
that whenever an attack should occur, '* one whole battalion," 
says Colonel O'Neill, '' might march with sword in hand to 
cut off the enemy, as fast as they could pass the river '."^ 
This command to the engineers, stated to have been origi- 
nally suggested by the Duke of Tyrconnel,-* principally pro- 
ceeded from a plan of the French General, to train his raw 
regiments at this favourable juncture to " fire and discipline," 
by making them mount guard in turn in front of the enemy ; 
and, at the same time, to provide against any sudden danger 
that might result from such a measure, by enabling assistance 
to reach such inexperienced soldiers, as soon as possible, 
from his camp — for which object, the demolition of works, 
that were not only of no great strength, but would be a delay 
to the arrival of such assistance from the camp, w^as abso- 
lutely necessary. 

' Story, Cont. Hist. p. 105 & 6. Harris, p. 320. 

2 Story, Harris, Dairy mple, ut sup. 

3 Letter, ap. Rawdon Papers, p. 347 and 8. Berwick's Memoirs, vol. 
I. p. 98. King James, vol. ii. p. 455. Story, Cont. Hist. p. 108 and 109. 

^ MacGeoghegan, vol. iii. p. 462. 



278 THE GREEN BOOK. 

But this order respecting the works was not executed, 
partly, it would seem, from the neglect of the French engi- 
neers, and partly from the opposite counsel of Lieutenant 
General D'Usson. That French officer was averse to any 
measure of the kind, being of opinion that ''their business 
was to defend, not demolish fortresses ; and, as a substitute 
for such an order, and for the plan of training the recruits 
which would render it necessary, proposed to have ''a re- 
gular garrison of choice men fixed in the place proper to 
sustain an attack !" — but, at the same time, says King 
James, he was ''confident the English would never attempt 
so bould an action !"^ Through an unhappy fatality attend- 
ing those counsels — St. Ruth, besides this difference of 
opinion with D'Usson, being engaged, through his own 
overbearing pride and violence, in an unjust persecution of 
the Duke of TyrconneP — the had portion of each of those 
opinions was adopted and the good rejected — D'Usson's 
proposal of keeping a strong and experienced garrison in 
the town, whose presence there would at once secure it 
from any hostile coup de main, and be the only reason for 
not meddling with the fortifications, being set aside, and St. 
Ruth's plan of training his recruits in the place being 
agreed to , but ivithout the original precaution of demolishing 
the works, in order to reinforce such bad troops in case of any 
sudden emergency — a neglect, which, in sight of an enemy 
merely divided from the ruined walls of the Irish town by a 
fordable river, and likely to be rendered only more daring 
in proportion to the very difficulty of his situation, was, it 
is needless to say, the very height of folly and rashness. 
Yet even this was not the whole of the almost inconceiv- 

^ King James, vol. ii. p. 455, and Colonel Felix O'Neill's Letter as 
last quoted. 

^ King James, vol. ii. p. 452, 55, 60, and 61. Berwick's Memoirs, 
vol. I. p. 99 and 100. Story, Cont. Hist. p. 187 and 88. The outrages 
of St. Ruth and his partisans, to drive the excellent Viceroy from the 
army, which they shortly after did, exceeded all decency ; and what luck 
could attend the cause of Ireland, when Richard Talbot, Duke of Tyr- 
connel, was so treated ? His picture is, I understand, at Malahide Castle ; 
and I blush for the ignorance or ingratitude of my countrymen, when 
I think that an engraving is not made from that picture, and a copy of 
it over the chimney-piece of every Irishman, or, at least, of every Irish- 
man who is a Roman Catholic. The Duke and his venerable and per- 
secuted brother, Peter Talbot, Archbishop of Dublin, were indeed a 
noble pair — lucidi fratres ! — Hlberniores ipsis Hihernis ! 



THE GREEN BOOK. 279 

able mismanagement on the part of the Irish, or rather on 
that of their leaders. We learn from the unexceptionable 
testimony of the Irish Colonel so often cited, that, when the 
2 or 3 regiments of raw recruits who were appointed to 
guard the town^ were marched to their post, they were 
actually sent there without any powder, for which they had 
to make no less than 3 several applications before it could 
be obtained ; that, when pow^der was obtained, ball was 
wanting, and that, by some unhappy misconception, this 
could not be gotten from Brigadier Maxw^ell, who was then 
on duty, and who, though an undoubtedly brave and faith- 
ful officer, as his subsequent conduct evinced, is mentioned 
to have replied to an application of Colonel Cormac 
O'Neill's men for a supply of bullets, by jestingly asking 
them — perhaps from a notion that they already had a suffi- 
cient allowance — " Whether they designed to kill larks ?" 
or '' lav racks, ^^ as he called them, says Colonel Felix 
O'Neill. In fine, even when Maxwell himself, with the 
natural sagacity of a Scotchman, suspected, from the aspect 
of things on the English side of the river, that the enemy 
were really preparing for an attack, and thereupon sent word 
to St. Ruth of the necessity of sending a reinforcement to 
the garrison, he was insultingly answered by the French- 
man, with that "pride which goeth before a fall" — yet in 
much the same way he himself had replied to the demand 
for bullets, that " If he was afraid, another General Officer 
v/ould be sent there !"^ 

Ginckle, meantime, was amply vindicating the justice of 
Maxw^ell's warning, by taking every precaution that could 
undeceive and punish the foolish and insolent self-security 
of the arrogant Frenchman. Two deserters who swam 
over the river to the Dutch general, brought him word, that 
every thing on the other side w^as just in such a posture as 

' Berwick's Memoirs, vol. i. p. 98. King James, vol. ii. p. 455. Story, 
Cont. Hist. p. 106. Harris, p. 320. Dairy mple, vol. iii. p. 156. 

2 Colonel Felix O'Neill and the Duke of Berwick, as before cited. 
The information supplied by the Colonel respecting this want of bullets 
on the side of the garrison, is very valuable, as showing that the slight 
resistance offered to the subsequent passage of the river by the English, 
was 7iut owing to any want of bravery, even in regiments allowed on all 
hands to have been composed of mere recruits, and the very worst in 
the whole Irish army. When the Irish have ever seemed to " fight badly 
at home," it is well to know why such was the case. " It is the cause, 
it ]% the cause, my soul !" as Othello says. 



280 THE GREEN BOOK. 

to favour his enterprise, — from the few bad regiments of 
which the garrison was composed, — the general confidence 
that he was going to raise the siege, — and the persuasion, 
that another attempt upon the place, with an army encamped 
so near it, was impossible!^ 

This, instead of inspiring Ginckle with any of the con- 
temptuous supineness of his Gallic adversary, made the 
diligent Dutchman leave nothing undone that could '' make 
assurance doubly sure !" Ladders were privately prepared 
in every part of the English town, and placed against the 
walls opposite the ruined Irish works, that from those 
walls, which the very inferior artillery of the Irish had not 
been able to overthrow, an unceasing fire might be poured 
down upon the garrison, in addition to the general discharge 
which w^as at the same time to be made from the English 
batteries ; and, as soon as Mackay's 2,000 men, with a 
choice support of 1,000 more,^ should march to attempt the 
ford, the rest of the garrison were to follow them, and the 
main army to enter the English town and sustain the whole, 
by endeavouring to pass on their bridge of boats beloiv or 
to the left of the ford, and above, or on the right, to cross 
at the long-contested town-bridge upon planks thrown over 
the broken arch. To animate Mackay's picked troops, in 
particular, who were to begin the attack, and on w^hose 
conduct ALL now depended, nothing was omitted. In addi- 
tion to the veteran general under whom they were placed, 
and who was to march on foot beside them, they were to 
be accompanied by several of William's greatest officers, 
amongst w^iom were the Duke of Wirtemberg, second in 
command to Ginckle, the Prince of Hesse Darmstadt, Bri- 
gadiers La Melloniere and Belassis, Major General Count 
Tettau, and Major General Talmash, who volunteered at 
the head of a party of grenadiers, under Colonel Gustavus 
Hamilton." xind, to appeal to a still stronger principle of 
duty amongst English and mercenary soldiers, than any 
feelings that could be excited by the presence of any leaders, 
however brave, numerous, and noble, a second distribution 

' Story, Harris, and Dalrymple, ut sup. 

2 Tindal, vol. in. p. 117. 

3 Story, Tindal, Harris, Dalrymple, ut sup. By section 45 of the 
Report of the English Parliament on Irish Forfeitures, given by Mac- 
Geoghegan, (vol. iii. p. 488 — 509,) it appears that Gustavus Hamilton 
was rewarded, principally for his conduct in this affair at Athlone, with 
5,382 acres ! 



THE GREEN BOOK. 281 

of *'handfuis of money," like that of the 29th, took place 
by order of Ginckle, in the shape of a large amount of 
guineas !^ 

In this unequal state of things — in which two or three 
raw regiments, ''never hitherto trusted with the works, "^ 
inadequately supplied with ammunition, with no mounted 
or effective artillery, with several large breaches in itie wall 
towards the enemy, and separated from and refused rein- 
forcements by their own general, were opposed, with little 
more than the intervention of afordable river, to the assault 
of an entire army, furnished with every means of crossing, 
animated by the presence of their noblest leaders, abun- 
dantly supplied with ammunition, aided by a powerful fire 
of musketry from behind lofty walls, still more formidably 
assisted by the discharge of eight large batteries, and, in 
fine, primed for the attack with handfuls of gold — in this 
state of things, in which almost every possible advantage 
w^as on the side of the Endish, without even the drawback 
of an ignorance of the situation of the Irish, which the two 
deserters to Ginckle had made known, the time for action 
arrived. The clock struck six. At six minutes after, the 
church-bell in the English town tolled the signal of advance. 
The long line of the English musketry was pointed down 
upon, and the fire of their artillery instantly directed against, 
the Irish town. The head of Mackay's column, composed 
of 60 grenadiers in armour under Captain Sandys, advancing 
20 abreast, and followed by another strong body encouraged 
and accompanied by the principal British and Continental 
officers of their army, plunged into and advanced through 

^ Story reluctantly "lets the cat out of the bag" respecting these 
golden donatives — only mentioning this second of them which did 
happen to succeed, and completely passing over any account of the 
FIRST, or that of the 29th, which did not succeed. " And for the greater 
encouragement to the soldiers," says that writer, " the general distributed 
a sum of guineas amongst them, knowing the powerful influence of 
gold, though our army," he goes on, " had as little occasion for such 
gratuities (I mean as to that point of whetting their courage) as any 
in all the world, and have done as much without them !" (Cont. Hist. 
jO. 106.) As if Englishmen and Dutchmen would part with thousands 
of guineas for nothing/ — and as i^ their "soldiers," amply equipped, 
highly paid, richly bribed, and so superior both in numbers and artillery, 
really did " as much" as the poor fellows opposed to them, who were in 
want of almost every thing but courage, and were receiving but a penny 
a day! 

2 Mackay ap. Dalrymple, vol. in. p. 156. 

24 



282 THE GREEN BOOK. 

the ford over the river, amidst '' the huzzas of their own 
body to drown their fears,^^ says Dalrymple, writing from 
Mackay, *' and of their friends behind to animate their 
hopes r'^ As " the deepest part of the river did 7iot reach 
their breasts, the water having never been known so shal- 
loiv in the memory of man,^^ the ford, notwithstanding 
'' some large stones" in the bottom, and the stream being 
described as *' rapid," was very soon passed, — the landing 
on the opposite bank being greatly facilitated by the several 
large breaches that had been made in the Irish walls, one 
of which was immediately in front of the ford itself.^ 
Taken at such a disadvantage, with St. Ruth's army at two 
miles' distance — capable of opposing but a comparatively 
feeble fire, and that 7iot of artillery, from the ruined citadel 
or castle, in answer to the enemy's numerous cannon — 
distracted at once by all those batteries, by the galling mus- 
ketry from the marksmen on the ladders behind the Eng- 
lish walls, by the tumultuous advance of Mackay 's grena- 
diers through the water, by the prospect, on the opposite 
bank, of the rest of the English army hurrying to the right 
and left of the ford, in order to pass towards the bridge, and 
the place for launching the pontoons — assailed, struck 
down, and confused by a crowd of difficulties so over- 
whelming, especially to completely inexperienced troops — 
and, in addition to all these circumstances, in want of a 
proper supply of bullets, and deprived of their principal 
officer, Lieutenant-General D'Usson, who, not dreaming 
of any thing like an attack, was taking some refreshment 
about the distance of a cannon shot from the town,^ — the 
Irish garrison could only pour one hurried, ill-served, and 
retreating discharge of musketry upon the approaching 
column,* — reserving any further attempt at resistance for a 
less-exposed situation than the breaches on the bank of the 

^ Idem. Ibid. Story, Harris, &c. 

2 Story, Cent. Hist. p. 103, 106 & 7. King James, vol. ir. p. 455, 
«fec. &c. 

2 For this absence of D'Usson, King James says, " St. Ruth (had 
he lived) would have called him to an accoimt; he made haste indeed 
to the town upon the first alarm, but was borne down and run over by 
The men that lied." (Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 455.) 

^ ''Les ennemis," says the Duke of Berwick, "se jetterent dans I'eau 
«& attaquerent la breche, que nos troupes abandonnerent apres une de- 
charge /" Why the Irish fired but this '' one discharge," has been suffi- 
ciently explained by Colonel Felix OTseill. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 283 

river, or, in other words, for the entrenchments within the 
town, where, though without ammunition, (against those 
who had plenty of it,) they would be necessarily relieved 
from the terrible fire of Ginckle's guns and musketry from 
the walls of the English town, when once his own men 
had crossed. 

The troops of Mackay, says the copyist of his Memoirs, 
'' mounted the breaches which had been made in the walls 
next the river, and divided. One party masked the Castle, 
made way for others passing the river, and then followed 
the ramparts of the town, partly to strike terror into the 
garrison by getting behind them, and pardy to prevent the 
entrance of succours from the Irish camp. Another turned 
above the ford to the broken arch of the bridge, to assist 
their friends who were making a passage of planks on the 
opposite side. A third wheeled below the ford to secure 
the point of landing for the bridge of boats, which the Eng- 
lish were throwing across the river," and "when the ford 
and bridges were laid open, multitudes passed over."^ The 
Irish garrison, in some instances, tied, but, in others, stood 
to their works, in which, says Story, ''a great many of 
them were killed," until, after a resistance of something 
"less than half an hour," (under circumstances, in which 
it is only wonderful there should have been any resistance 
at all !) 500 of them were slain. Upon this, the remainder, 
quitting their entrenchments, got over the ramparts w^here- 
ever they could find them unoccupied by the enemy, and 
so evacuated the town.^ Brigadier Maxwell — whose warn- 
ing, if acted upon by St. Ruth, would have preserved the 
place now, as Wauchop's message to Colonel O'Reilly had 
formerly saved it at Lanesborough — on being forsaken by 
the troops around him, attempted, with some gallant Irish 
officers, to arrest the progress of the assailants ; and even 
did so, for a time, by preventing them from running along 
and seizing the rampart — thus enabling numbers of the gar- 
rison to escape ! But most of his brave companions being 
killed beside him, and he himself made prisoner, nothing 
remained to check the torrent, except the immense mass of 

1 Dairy mple, vol. in. p. 157. The words masked and the in this 
citation from Dalrymple are slight changes in that author's text, neces- 
sary to be made, though not of such importance as to be formally ac- 
counted for. 

5 Story, Cont. Hist. p. 107 & 8. 



284 THE GREEN BOOK. 

rubbish and ruins into which the town was converted — an 
obstacle so much more considerable than even a great por- 
tion of the Irish works, that, says Story, it ** occasioned our 
soldiers to curse and swear even amongst the bullets them- 
selves!"^ 

The moment Ginckle's troops entered the river, an ex- 
pTess had been despatched to St. Ruth with intelligence of 
the attack. The French General is described as having 
then been quite at ease in his tent, signing articles against 
the Duke of Tyrconnel, and about to set out on a shooting 
excursion. ''It is impossible," he exclaimed, on hearing 
the news, " that the English should attempt to take a 
town, and I so near with an army to succour it. I would 

GIVE 1,000 PISTOLES THEY DURST ATTEMPT IT !" To this 

boastful folly, Sarsfield, who was present, coolly replied, 
that, " he knew the enterprise was not too difficult for Eng- 
lish courage to attempt," and, he accordingly urged the 
necessity of instantly despatching reinforcements to the 
town! But St. Ruth only continuing to make a jest of the 
news, and the sensible advice founded upon it, high words, 
and a quarrel, subsequently productive of the most fatal con- 
sequences, ensued. 2 Finding^ however, from the prolonged 
noise of attack, that the English might be attempting what 
he pronounced ''impossible," and then extremely regretting 
his infatuation, the French General sent off Major General 
John Hamilton, with 2 brigades of infantry, to drive out the 
enemy. But though these Irish detachments, notwithstand- 
ing a march of 2 miles, and the time lost by St. Ruth when 
every moment was so precious, arrived soon enough to pro- 
tect and rally the remains of the fugitive garrison at the 
farthest works beyond the town, and even gave the van of 
the pursuers so warm a reception, that Brigadier Maxwell, 
who was present as a prisoner, is stated to have expressed 
himself as confident that the English would be beaten out 
again, such an attempt was soon relinquished as impossible, 
the western walls and ramparts, which had so unluckily 
been left standing, being completely lined by the rear divi- 
sion of Mackay's grenadiers under Colonel Gustavus Ha- 
milton, and the whole English force by this time swarming 
into the town. The 2 Irish brigades were therefore obliged 

^ Berwick's Memoirs, vol. i. p. 98 & 9. Story, ut sup. These bullets 
C£^me from the Castle. London Gazette^ No. 2678. 
' 2 Tindal's Rapin, vol. iii. p. 117 & 18. Harris, p. 321. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 285 

to return to their quarters, and St. Ruth that evening de- 
camped from the advantageous spot wliere he was then 
posted; "in which," says the Duke of Berwick, ''he acrain 
committed a great fault, since the enemy, though masters of 
Athlone, could not debouche from it, on account of a great 
bog!" — or rather on account of 2 bogs, through which the 
passage out of the town towards the west lay.^ The reduc- 
tion of the place was then completed by the fall of the Castle, 
which, notwithstanding its ruinous state, bravely continued 
to hold out ; but being now cut off from a7iy hope of relief, 
was surrendered at discretion, with above 500 men, by the 
Governor, Major General Wauchop.^ 

Thus, not through native, but foreign misconduct, not 
through the fault of the Irish, but of their General, Athlone 
was at length taken, after a resistance, of which the Irish 
Colonel, who witnessed it, justly says, that ^'noplace loas 
ever better defended than it ivas till the day when it teas 
lost by as perfect a surprise as ever was .'"^ Besides a 
considerable booty found among the ruins, and some meal, 
wheat, and other things, the enemy got 6 brass six- 
pounders, and 2 mortars, or the whole of the Irish siege 
artillery ; an artillery, it should be observed, above 4 times 
less in number of pieces than the English battering train 
of 29 cannon and 6 mortars, and still more, or almost im- 
measurably inferior, in w^eight of metal, to such large guns 
as Ginckle's, amongst which, we read, for instance, of 11 
twenty four and 9 ^i^/i^een-pounders.* According to the 

^ Story, Cont. Hist. p. 94, 108 & 9. Berwick's Memoirs, vol. i. p. 
99. ColonelKeatinge'sDefenceoflreland, p. 23&32. Tindal, &c. &c. 

2 Harris, p. 321. The garrison were, however, but 200 men, accord- 
ing to the London Gazette, No. 2678. 

3 Colonel Felix O'Neill, ap. Rawdon Papers, p. 347. King James, 
merely adverting to the badness of the garrison in the town, (without 
mentioning or being aware of the want of ammunition, which neces- 
sarily made that garrison still worse than it would otherwise have been.) 

justly speaks of the place as being lost by "misfortune, which," 

he adds, "always contribited more to the enemies success than Xh^vc own 
•vallour or experience." 

"^ Story, Cont. Hist. p. 108, and p. 95-98 & 101. At the page last 
cited, Story, (copying the London Gazette) has made the only 2 batte- 
ries of s/ege-cannon, which the Irish are known to have possessed, to 
have been, one of 3 and the other of 4 six-pounders, or seven pieces of 
cannon, in all. But as he himself finally says, that but six instead of 
^seven cannon were captured in the town when it was surprised, or 
when, from the ruins and other causes, none of those guns could be re- 

24* 



286 THE GREEN BOOK. 

lowest^ or MacGeoghegan's estimate, the entire loss of the 
Irish in the siege, it was above 1,000 killed, and 300 
prisoners, or something more than 1,300 men altogether. 
According to the highest accounts, or those of Story, Har- 
ris, and the London Gazette, it was 1,700 killed, of whom 
500 are stated to have perished in the last attack — and, be- 
tween prisoners and those surrendered with the Castle, w^ho 
were above 566 more, it was from 2,266 to 2,300 persons.^ 
The chief Irish officers left among the slain were 2 of the 
noble Milesian house of Macgennis, of the County Down ;2 

moved, even had they not been all dismounted, as they actually were^ 
I have corrected him by himself, {ante, p. 318, 19, & 20,) in making 
each of those 2 Irish batteries to have consisted of but three pieces, 
which, with the two mortars, form 8 guns, or all that were in the 
town. 

^ MacGeoghegan, vol. iii. p. 462. Story, Cont. Hist. p. 106. Harris, 
p. 321. London Gazette, No. 2679. 

2 The tribe of Macgennis, or Macginnis, whose head. Lord Iveagh, 
took part with King James in this war, were descended from the Irian 
or Rudrician Milesians, that gave kings to Ulster, from the remote pe- 
riod of the Milesian settlement in Ireland till the destruction of Emania 
and the conquest of the province by the descendants of Heremon, in the 
4th century. The Macgennises, who were the chiefs of the Rudrician 
line, notwithstanding their exclusion from the crown of Ulster by the 
Heremonian conquest, held a distinguished rank in that province, where 
their patrimony originally comprised the County of Down ; though 
their possessions were limited, at a later period, to " Hy-Veach, or 
Iveach, a territory," says MacGeoghegan, ^' of Dalaradia, in the County 
of Down, now forming part of the baronies of Upper and Lower Iveach, 
with some other territories in the same County," including "Maghinis, 
or Moy-Inis, .... now the barony of Lecale." Lord Iveagh, or his 
connexions, furnished King James with 2 regiments, or 1 of infantry 
and 1 of dragoons ; and, in that monarch's really natiorial Parliament 
of 1689, the County of Down was properly represented by Murtagh 
Macgennis of Greencastle, and Ever Macgennis of Castlewelan, Es- 
quires. His Lordship was also Lord Lieutenant of the County of Down, 
and 2 other Macgennises, his Deputy Lieutenants. Lord Iveagh, at the 
end of the war, did not accompany the Irish army to France, but entered 
the Imperial or Austrian service with a choice battalion of 500 men, 
composing part of a body, first of 1,400, and then of 2,000 Irish troops 
of King James's old army; who were landed from Cork at Hamburgh in 
June, 1692, and thence marched to fight against the Turks, in Hungary. 
A portion, however, of the regiments of Macgennis did go to France, 
and was embodied there with those of MacMahon, Macguire, and other 
Ulster regiments. {Harris, p. 217 4* 252. Story, Imp, Hist. p. 98. 
King^s State, <Sfc, Appendix, p. 61, 68, 69 <Sf 92. MacGeoghes;an, vol, 
I.JO. 302,8 4- 9, 4- vol. III. p. 469. London Gazettes of 1692, No. 
2732, 2736, 2760, 2777 Sf 2779.) 



THE GREEN BOOK. 287 

Colonel Art Oge MacMahon of the equally honourable tribe 
of the MacMahons of Monaghan ;' Colonel O'Gara, head 
of the ancient sept of the O'Garas of Coolavin, in the 

^ "Monaghan, called," says MacGeoghegan, "in the language of the 
country, Uriel, belonged to the MacMahons," — a race, adds the vener- 
able Charles O'Conor, " the subject of much panegyric in the works 
of our annalists and iileas." These MacMahons traced their origin to 
Heremon, son of Milesius, through Carbry Liffecar, King of Ireland, 
A. D. 296. Colonel Art MacMahon, above mentioned, was commander 
of a regiment of infantry, and entitled Oge, or the Young, being the 
younger brother of Father Gelasius MacMahon, who was the head of 
that illustrious house. This learned divine studied, with great distinc- 
tion, in the University of Valladolid, in Spain, taught philosophy, with 
equal credit, in the College of the Holy Cross, in Louvain ; and was a 
Master of Theology, and one of the Provincial Priors of his own order, 
the Dominican, in Ireland. After the death of his brother Colonel Art 
MacMahon, and the final extinction of King James's hopes in Ireland, 
Father MacMahon went to Rome, and thence to Louvain, where he 
endured many sufferings, in consequence of being deprived of any hope 
of returning to his native country, by the Orange Act of Parliament in 
1697, which made the presence, in Ireland, after a certain period, of any 
member of the monastic orders, transportation, and in case of return, 
death ! This accomplished gentleman and ecclesiastic finally settled, 
" apud Reveny super Mosani," says Doctor de Burgo, " ubi bene aesti- 
matus et amatus erat a clero et populo, et, post biennium impietum, cap- 
tus febri violenta, et munitus pie sacramentis, requievit in Domino, cum 
magno luctu conventus et populi, anno 1703, die ii Februarij." Father 
MacMahon, to his other literary acquisitions, added the merit of being 
an elegant poet, both in his native tongue, the Irish, and in Latin. His 
epitaph in Latin verse, upon the daughter of the Earl of Clanrickard, 
Honor De Burgo, — who was fi.rst married to Patrick Sarsfield, the cele- 
brated Earl of Lucan, and then to the illustrious James Fitzjames, Duke 
of Berwick and Marshal of France, — is preserved in that valuable monu- 
ment of Irish ecclesiastical and genealogical erudition, the Hibernia Do- 
minicana, (p. 278.) — Besides Colonel Art Oge MacMahon, who, in 
addition to his military command, was King James's Lord Lieutenant 
for the County of Monaghan, the Deputy Lieutenants for that County 
were Colonel Brian and Captain Hugh MacMahon ; the members 
of Parliament Brian and Hugh MacMahon, Esquires; Owen Mac- 
Mahon was likewise a Lieutenant Colonel of foot in the Irish army ; 
and Hugh MacMahon was Lieutenant Colonel of Gordon O'Neill's 
Charlemont Regiment of Infantry, (as new-modelled in 1695,) that 
went to France after the Treaty of Limerick. These northern Mac- 
Mahons must not be confounded with those of the south, who were not 
Heremonian, but Heberian Milesians, of the Dalcassian race, and whose 
patrimony consisted of Corcobaskin, or the present barony of Moyarta, 
in the County of Clare. (Hlb. Domin.p. 154 Sf 55, 278, 306 cf 528. 
King's State, c^c. Appendix, p. 61, 69, 70 4" 94. 0^ Conor'' s Disser- 
tationSf p, 236. MacGeoghegan, vol. i. p. 309 & 15, 4" voL iii. jD. 
468.) 



288 THE GREEN BOOK. 

County of Sligo ;^ and the heroic old Colonel Richard 
Grace, of Moyelly Castle, King's Count3s who was killed 
the day before the last successful attack, acting, notwith- 
standing his great age, with a spirit worthy of the illustrious 
blood of the great Palatine Barons of Courtstown — but 
more than all, of his oivn uniformly brave, loyal, and patri- 
otic career.^ 

' The O'Garas were Hiberian Milesians, and were the feudatory- 
Lords of the barony of Coolavin, in the County of Sligo, which " coun- 
try," according to O'Conor, ^^ they forfeited, — or, to speak more pro- 
perly, were robbed of — in the forty-one civil war." Story was wrong 
in mentioning Colonel O'Gara as killed. There is but one Colonel 
O'Gara in King's authentic hst of James's officers, who must be the 
same that is mentioned to have distinguished himself in this war, and 
who may have been left among the dead. But, from O'Conor and 
MacGeoghegan, he is known to have accompanied the Irish army, after 
the surrender of Limerick, to the Continent, where he was Lieutenant 
Colonel to King James's fine Royal Regiment of Irish Foot Guards, 
amounting, before its departure from Limerick for France, to 1,400 
strong ! Colonel Oliver O'Gara, who was the head of his race, was 
married to Mary Fleming, (daughter of Fleming, Lord Baron of Slane, 
and the 18th Irish Peer of his name) from which marriage there were 4 
sons, all of high distinction in the Spanish or Imperial services, of whom 
more on a future occasion. {0^ Conor'' s Dissertations, p. 239, 243 c^ 
44. MacGeoghegan, Hist, tome iii. />. 751 — French copy. Harris, 
p.2b\, Sfc. 6fc.) 

2 Colonel Richard Grace was the younger son of Robert Grace, Baron 
of Courtstown, in the County of Kilkenny, descended from the cele- 
brated Raymond le Gros. In the great civil war under Charles I., he 
went to England, and distinguished himself in the king's service, till the 
surrender of Oxford to the Parliament, in 1646. He then came over to 
Ireland, and raised, by his family wealth and influence, a small force, 
sometimes amounting to 5,000, but generally to no more than 3,000 
men. At the head of this little army, he for several years rendered him- 
self so formidable to the Parliamentary and Cromwellian bigots and 
robbers, that they offered £500 for his head, (or a higher sum than they 
placed on any of their enemies,) yet were glad, in 1652, or when he 
was reduced to the utmost extremity, to admit him to an honourable 
capitulation, by which he was allowed to embark for the Continent 
with his regiment of 1,200 men, and was even to be supplied with 
money, and every other necessary, for the voyage. He had the glory 
of being the last who held out for the royal cause in Ireland, and with 
the brave " companions of his fortune," signalized himself on the Con- 
tinent, both by his conduct in the French and Spanish services, and by 
his loyalty and attachment to the exiled royal family. He was made 
Chamberlain to the Duke of York, afterwards James II., by whom he 
was treated rather as a friend and equal, than a subject ; and, on the 
Restoration, in 1660, returned to England with the Stuarts, by whom 
he was restored to his estates in the King's County, which had been 



THE GREEN BOOK. 289 

The capture of the place cost the English, amongst other 
things, 50 tons of gunpowder, 600 bombs, a great many- 
usurped by an individual named "John Vaughan," one of Cromwell's 
low and sanguinary banditti. The Colonel was also granted the rever- 
sion of some valuable lands in the County of Kildare by Charles II., in 
June, 1670, and was further rewarded with a pension of £300 a year 
by James II., in 1685. After that monarch's flight to France, Colonel 
Grace, being appointed Governor of Athlone, displayed a zeal and ac- 
tivity in the royal cause, equally worthy of his youthful achievements 
at home and on the Continent, and astonishing in such an old man. 
Having, for instance, on one occasion, left Athlone to hurry up a rein- 
forcement of 400 men to the town from a part of the County of Kil- 
kenny, more than 70 miles distant, he returned from that part of Kil- 
kenny after a march of but two days, during which he accompanied his 
men on foot ! — thus walking, notwithstanding his great age, a space of 
above 35 miles on each of those two days ! Another time, he rode to 
Dubhn from Athlone and back again, or 118 Irish miles, in 24 hours ! 
He enforced the strictest discipline amongst his soldiers, of whom he 
hanged no less than 10 at once outside the town, to suppress every 
thing like military outrage; yet, owing to the natural love of justice 
amongst the Irish, even when directed against themselves, he is men- 
tioned to have eminently possessed their aflections and confidence. His 
conduct to the Protestants, in particular, (who afterwards showed how 
badly they deserved his kindness,) was equally remarkable for its justice 
and humanity ; so that, till the arrival of William's commander. Lieu- 
tenant General Douglas, after the battle of the Boyne, at the head of 
between 8 and 9,000 men and 14 pieces of artillery, the country about 
Athlone was a scene of perfect tranquillity. William's commander, 
having sent a drummer to summon the fortress. Colonel Grace fired a 
pistol at the messenger, (though not so as to kill or wound him,) and 
replied — '• These are ?7ii/ terms ; these only I will give or receive ; and, 
when my provisions are consumed, I will defend till I eat my old boots !" 
This threat he made good ; hoisting a bloody flag, foiling an attempt of 
a detachment of 3,000 English horse and foot to cross the Shannon at 
Lanesborough, killing Douglas's best gunner, and forcing the enemy, 
after remaining a week before the place, to retreat, accompanied by the 
Protestants of the district, who, with an antinationality and ingratitude 
equally disgusting and base, joined Douglas, notwithstanding the ac- 
knowledged mildness and equity they had experienced, but were, it is 
pleasing to add, requited with a gratitude equal to their own, by their 
'Pvotestant friends and deliverers, in being delivered, on the retreat, by 
those " true believers" of whatever they possessed, and thus exposed to 
perish ! In the account of the final surprise of Athlone by Ginckle, in 
the London Gazette, it is mentioned that the body of the venerable 
warrior, by whom the place had, the previous year, been so successfully 
defended, was found amidst the slain, where it had lain from the day 
before, when he was killed. Colonel Richard Grace (judging of his 
appearance in youth by the representation that is given of him in ar- 
mour, and prefixed to the sketch of his life in the interesting Memoirs 



290 THE GREEN BOOK. 

tons of stones, shot from their mortars, and 12,000 cannon 
balls ;^ to say nothing of the more valuable metal distri- 
buted, on different occasions, to their soldiers, in handfuls. 
As the English were protected in the greater part of their 
operations by the walls of the English town, and as the 
artillery in the Irish town was so very inferior to theirs, 
Ginckle's loss was necessarily much less than the loss of 



of the Family of Grace, by Sheffield Grace, Esq., F. S. A.) was of a 
slender form, well adapted for activity, and possessed an elegant, pleas- 
mg and pointed countenance, being, on the whole, a fine specimen of 
the Norman-Irish nobility — a splendid race, who, if they acquired much 
frora Ireland, yet, with the black exception of the infamous Ormonds, 
mostly compensated for all they took, by ultimately considering them- 
selves of the country, spending what they got in the country, and glo- 
riously standing by or falling with the country ! At the time of his 
death, the veteran Colonel had a fourth time commanded at Athlone; 
his burning of the English town on Douglas's approach, being the third 
time he had set it on fire ; the two previous destructions of the place 
having occurred in the preceding civil war of 1641. His memory is 
still deservedly revered by tradition in the neighbourhood of the town, 
which he so bravely defended, and where he so gallantly fell. He left 
but one child, a daughter, to whom the circumstance of her being a 
woman, and the only offspring of such a max, was of no avail, to pre- 
serve any part of her illustrious father's estates from the brutal and in- 
satiable grasp of Orange or Williamite rapacity. Of John Grace, the 
last great Palatine Baron of Courtstown, the head of the race of Ray- 
mond k Gros, and whose beauty, gallantry, generosity, and high spirit, 
were such, that, in his youth, he was restored to his estates, amounting 
to 32,870 acres in Kilkenny and Tipperary, even by Cromwell himself, 
the following anecdotes should not be omitted in connexion with the ac- 
count of his kinsman, the Colonel, and the cause for which the whole 
family suffered so much : — " On the Revolution," says Mr. Sheffield 
Grace, "he (the old Baron) raised and equipped a regiment of foot and 
a troop of horse, at his own expense, for the service of King James, 
whom he farther assisted with money and plate, amounting, it is said, 
to £14,000 ! Possessing a high character, and great local influence, 
he was early solicited, with splendid promises of royal favour, to join 
King William's party ; but yielding to the strong impulse of honour- 
able feelings, he instantly, on perusing the proposal to this effect from 
one of the Duke of Schomberg's emissaries, seized a card, accidentally 
lying near him, and returned this indignant answer upon it — ' Go, tell 
your master, I despise his offer : tell him that honour and conscience 
are dearer to a gentleman than all the wealth and titles a prince can 
bestow !' This card, (the six of hearts.) which he sent uncovered by 
the bearer of the rejected offer, is to this day very generally known by 
the name of ' Grace's card' in the city of Kilkenny." {Memoirs of the 
Family of Grace, p. 27-34, (^ p. 35-48, ^c. ^c.) 
^ Story, Cont. Hist. p. 115. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 291 

the Irish. But, it was, most assuredly, much more than 
was acknowledged, or only "• about 60 killed and 120 
wounded," — from the 1 9th to the 30th of June, both inclu- 
sive ! Of these but 47 are affirmed to have been slain or 
hurt in the last attack — the only credible part of the state- 
ment, since the Irish wanted bullets on that occasion.^ On 
the following evening, which was the anniversary of the 
battle of the Boyne, Ginckle, after the burial of the dead, 
celebrated his success with a degree of rejoicing propor- 
tioned to the danger which he had escaped, and the good 
fortune by which he had been so remarkably befriended. 
His entire army was drawn out ; three rounds were given 
from 41 pieces of cannon f the like number were then 
fired by the infantry and cavalry ; and the whole spectacle 
was concluded with bonfires — a melancholy sight to the 
surrounding country ! 

St. Ruth, who, after this just punishment of his pride and 
folly, had fallen back the same evening about a mile towards 
Milton Pass, retreated next day, the 1st of July, in the direc- 
tion of Ballinasloe, and, crossing to the Roscommon side 
of the river Suck, encamped along it for several days, at a 
pass so eligible for defence as to be only inferior to that for 

» Story, ib. p. 108, 12(> & 21. With respect to the degree of humanity 
displayed by the English on the capture of the place, Story's evidently 
hesitating or consciously untrue assertion, that Ginckle's troops, '' when 
they saw themselves really masters of the town, were not at all forward 
to kill those at their mercy, tho' it was in a manner in the heat of ac- 
tion," is contradicted, as if expressly, by the positive and more credible 
testimony of Lesley, who says, that " King William's army, after being 
entire masters of Athlone, killed in cold blood 100 men in the Castle 
and little outwork on the river." 

2 Id. ib. p. 114 & 15. From this statement of Ginckle's cannon at 
Athlone at 41 pieces, his whole artillery there would amount to 47 
guns, the mortars, which were 6, being added to the 41 cannon. And, 
deducting 12 of the latter as field guns, the English battering train 
would consequently be 35 pieces in all, or 29 cannon and 6 mortars. 
From the shattered state, however, to which these large battering pieces 
very soon reduced the Irish works, the 12 ^eM-pieces would appear to 
have been Hkewise of great service to the English in the siege. {See 
before, p. 255 and note 106.) Besides those 47 guns, Ginckle had left 
12 cannon at Mullingar and Ballymore, {Cont. Hist. p. 85 c^ 93,) 
some of which were, no doubt, originally a part of Schomberg's and 
William's old trains, added to a portion of the last fine new train sent 
over from England in the spring. The superiority of the English in 
artillery, throughout the entire war, was enormous. 



292 THE GREEN BOOK. 

which he subsequently quitted it.^ " In this retreat," says 
King James, " the Conough regiments grew very thin, so 
that theybo^ by desertion and maroding was reduced from 
17,000 to about 11,000 men l"^ This, in fact, was not 
surprising; for, as St. Ruth had conducted himself towards 
the Irish officers with overbearing disrespect and contempt, 
so he had acted towards the Irish soldiers with the insuffer- 
able inhumanity of a most arbitrary martinet — sometimes 
hanging ''a dozen of them in a morning" for what they 
considered ^'very slender faults,"^ and were, no doubt, ex- 
cusable in considerino^ as such, on account of the miserable 
inadequacy of their pay. This offensive arrogance and 
unseasonable rigour, which could only have been submitted 
to with any patience if compensated by a proportionate de- 
gree of success, made the French General so unpopular, 
and, after his last disgrace, so ridiculous to the Irish army, 
that even the troops who adhered to their colours, con- 
trasting the insulting self-superiority which he had as- 
sumed, with the miserable reverse which he had just oc- 
casioned entirely by his own fault, rejoiced over and jested 
at his humiliation, though it was productive of such bad 
consequences to themselves and their country. St. Ruth, 
on his part, was 7ioiv but too well convinced of the impro- 
priety and impolicy of conduct which had caused the loss 
of such an important river-barrier and fortress; and had 
ended in the still more alarming alienation and diminution 
of his army. He likewise saw that he had placed himself 
under a necessity of risking every thing, since he could 
neither answer to King James, nor to his own more formi- 
dable master, Louis XIV., for the unpardonable fault he had 
committed. His original intention of spinning out the war 
in order to wear down the enemy in a hostile territory, and 
gain time for the arrival of succours from France, was con- 
sequently laid aside ; and he determined upon giving battle 

' King James, vol. ii. p. 455 and 6. Story, Cont. Hist. p. 114 and 
121. 

2 Id. ib. p. 456. This is a very useful passage of the royal author, 
since it shows the real number of the Irish infantry at Aughrim to 
have been about eleven instead of twenty thousand men, at which they 
have hitherto been amplified to the world by Story, and his blind or 
prejudiced coypists. See also, on the head of desertion. Story, {Cont, 
Hist. p. 115;) Major General Mackay, {ap. Dairy mple, vol, in. p. 158 ;) 
and Harris, (p. 322.) 

3 Story, Cont. Hist. p. 114. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 293 

to the English on the earliest opportunity, to efface the mis- 
management of the past by victory, or avoid the responsi- 
bility of the future by death. To recover the good will of 
his army, so indispensable on an important and critical 
emergency, when opposite feelings of indifference or aver- 
sion would be so fatal, he completely discarded his former 
obnoxious haughtiness and severity, and tried an opposite 
manner, as the result showed, with the happiest effect — 
treating the Irish officers with familiarity, and acting with 
kindness to the common soldiers.^ The principal danger 
which he had provoked being thus removed, he then occu- 
pied himself in preparing such a position as would compen- 
sate as much as possible for the very inferior numbers of 
his army, by the protection it would afford to them, and the 
various obstacles it would present to the gready superior 
forces of the English. St. Ruth, in spite of his faults, was, 
in fact, a man of talent, as he evinced by the general tenor 
of his conduct after the fall of Athlone, with the one fataU 
and, as would seem, fated exception, of his unreconciled 
quarrel with Sarsfield. 

Ginckle, after the capture of Athlone, made a considera- 
ble stay there ; resting his troops ; putting the place into a 
state of defence ; occupying with militia the different passes 
on the Shannon, which the Irish ev^acuated, from Athlone 
to James-town ; issuing proclamations, and offering the 
greatest inducements to the Irish to submit or desert ; re- 
ceiving reinforcements from England ; strengthening his 
army still more, by thinning even his already small garrisons; 
ordering additional regiments to be hastened up to his aid, 

' Dairy mple, vol. in. p. 158. Berwick's Memoirs, vol. i. p. 100. Story, 
4tc., ut sup. Along the western side of the Shannon, or in those parts 
of Connaught which were the immediate scenes of St. Ruth's last cam- 
paign, the French General and Sarsfield, are, of all King James's offi- 
cers, alone remembered in popular tradition ; and though the impolitic 
rigour and pride that alienated the Irish and lost Athlone, is viewed in 
the same light by the peasantry at present as by their brave forefathers, 
yet the French general's subsequent conduct is justfly considered to have 
amply cancelled all his previous errors, and is still generally associated, 
in the minds of the people, with such feelings as those conveyed in the 
verse of the old song, — 

Pat and Monsieur, while pressing on 

Surly John Bull, to grieve him, 
Will call for the piper of Blessington, 

And strike up — " the Devil relieve him!" 
25 



294 THE GREEN BOOK. 

even from the extremities of Munster ; replenishing his 
military chest and magazines with several wagons and carts 
of money, ammunition, and other necessaries, that arrived 
every day from Dublin ; and, in short, taking so many pre- 
cautions, previous to a further advance, as sufficiently indi- 
cate how little he agreed in opinion with those who affirm, 
that the Irish have "always fought badly at home,'"^ He 
did not make any attempt to reconnoitre the Irish army 
until the 4th of July, when he sent out a detachment of 
horse and mounted grenadiers in the evening upon that ser- 
vice, under the guidance and command of one Higgins, who 
had been a priest. 

They advanced within 3 miles of the Irish camp, when a 
body of Irish cavalry, who were waiting in ambush in the 
woods of Clanoult, rushed out upon and drove the traitor 
and his followers to an adjacent bridge, where, though the 
English endeavoured to take advantage of the narrowness of 
the place to defend themselves, and made a stout resistance 
for some time, the Irish broke and dispersed them, 15 of the 
English being killed, 4 taken prisoners, and " the rest," says 
Story, *' escaping with Higgins, who was sadly wounded T'^ 

^ Stoiy, Cont. Hist. p. 114, 121. Mackay ap. Dalrymple, vol. iii. p. 
158. Harris, p. 321 — 324. To omit nothing that might weaken and 
gain over the Irish, Ginckle settled allowances " to all persons that would 
come off, according to their several qualifications, (viz.) CoUoneis of 
Horse and Dragoons £11, 10s. per month, and Foot £10 per month, 
and so proportionably to every one." (Story.) 

2 Id. ib. p. 116. London Gazette, No. 2679. This Higgins, whose 
infamous treason and hostility to his country richly merited the fate he 
met with, and even a much worse one, presents a very different spectacle 
to others of his name, religion, and sacred profession, of whom two, 
bearing the appellation of Peter, suffered death for their faith, in Dublin, 
in 1641, and the third, called Thomas, met with the same treatment from 
the hands of the Cromwellian tyrants, at Clonmel, in 1651. (Hlb, Dom. 
J). 561 Sf 569.) In the present more liberal and enlightened times, that 
old Milesian name, so honoured by a triple martyrdom beyond any passing 
stain that could be cast upon it by a solitary traitor, is represented in the 
Irish Catholic Church by the Bishop of Ardagh, a prelate than whom 
few, if any, more happily adorn the sacred dignity of the mitre, with the 
intellectual and social qualities of the scholar and the man. About the 
year 1610, there were two distinguished Irish poets, brothers, of this sept, 
in the County of 8Iigo. The first, named Tiege Dall, was, says Mr. 
O'Reilly, equally " famous for the elegance of his encomiums, and the 
keenness of his satire;" the latter of which cost him his life, and that of 
his wife and child, at the hands of some members of the tribe of O'Hara, 
who had suffered by the galling iambics of this Irish Archilochus. The 
other brother, Maolmuire, was also Archbishop of Tuam; and the com- 



THE GREEN BOOK. 295 

Three days after, another detachment of English horse, under 
Captain Villers, were more fortunate in venturing out towards 
Ballinasloe to take a view of the Irish army ; though without 
obtaining any success to compensate for the reverse of Hig- 
gins's party. At last, having duly fortified Athlone, and 
garrisoned it w^ith 2 regiments under Colonel Lloyd, Ginckle 
slowly proceeded, on the 10th, to Killcashel, 7 miles nearer 
the Irish, where he stopped that night. On the 11th, he 
renewed his march in the direction of Ballinasloe, encamp- 
ing on the Roscommon side of the river Suck — " a good 
pass," says my English authority, '• and the Irish might 
have given us some trouble in gaining it ; but that they had 
found out a much better place, as will soon appear."^ The 

positions of both, in their native language, are still extant in MS. ( Trans, 
lb. Celt. Society, p. clxx. to p. clxxiv.) In the last century, Sir John 
O'Higgins, who was First Physician and Counsellor of State to Philip V. 
of Spain, rendered himself remarkable, as the discoverer, in a Gallician 
monastery, of a curious parchment MS. in the Gothic character, entitled 
** Concordantia Hispani^e atque Hiberxi.^ a Sedulio Scoto, genere 
Hiherniensi, et episcopo Oretensi" which, as its title partly imports, was 
written some time previous to A. D. 710 or 711, by Sedulius, (or Shiel) 
surnamed the Younger, an Irishman, Bishop of Oreto, in Spain, for the 
purpose of showing that the Spanish clergy ought not" to object to his 
being appointed by the Pope to a bishopric there, under the pretext of 
his being a stranger, as the Irish were of the same stock, or descended 
from the Spaniards !-^a point, on which it is mentioned, that Sedulius 
was accordingly allowed the privileges of a Spaniard, at that early period 
— and an admission which, taken in connexion with the substantially 
corroborative evidence of a passage from the Welsh writer Nennius, who 
lived not far from those times, as well as with the general tradition of 
both the Spanish and Irish people, might have made Mr. Moore hesitate 
in entirely discarding the idea of a Milesian settlement in Ireland. 
(Harrises Irish Writers, p. 47 Sc 8. MacGeoghegan, vol. i. p. 140. 
O^Halloran^s Introduction, chap. vii. Trans. Royal Irish Academy ^ 
vol. xvi. part ii. p. 17, 18, Sfc.) This Sir John O'Higgins was likewise, 
no doubt, the great-grandfather of Don Bernardo O'Higgins, President 
of the republic of Chili, whose character is sufficiently distinguished in 
the annals of the last eventful struggle for South American independence 
against Spain, to the success of which, as well as to the contest for North 
American freedom, Irish blood so amply contributed. The original 
founder of this old Irish name, which is also written without a final s, 
was a son of Niall the Great, of the Nine Hostages, and of the Here- 
monian race, who was monarch of Ireland at the end of the 4th century, 
and the great progenitor of the princely house of O'Neill. — {O^ Conor'' s 
Irish Genealogies, 4"C.) 

' At this place, as has been previously intimated, St. Ruth appears to 
have first thought of giving battle to Ginckle, till a survey of the position 
at Aughrim showed that " second thoughts were best," 



296 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Irish out-guards upon the hills of Garbally, fell back before 
the invaders to a place about 2 miles beyond Ballinasloe ; 
and the English still continuing to move forwards, and as- 
cending the hills which the Irish had quitted, Ginckle there 
at length beheld the whole Irish army encamped in the ad- 
mirable position which the French General had selected and 
prepared, in order to strike the last great blow for his own 
honour, and risk the last grand and decisive contest for the 
crown, religion, and liberty of Ireland ?^ 

About 3 miles south-west of Ballinasloe, where the country 
rises into high grounds, is situated the hill of Kilcomedan, 
the most prominent of these eminences. On the north-east 
side it ascends about 400 feet, so gradually as to be suited 
for the manoeuvring of cavalry and artillery. All along its 
front, and beyond its extremities to the right and left, there 
runs, through what is 7iow " a fine tract of meadow and pas- 
ture ground," a little river, whose current converted the soil, 
through which it then overflowed, into a complete mass of 
mud and water. This morass could only be passed through 
with difficulty in 2 places ; thus presenting a formidable 
barrier to the direct ascent of the hill. The 2 principal 
passes, or those leading round the morass on firm ground 
to each side of Kilcomedan, were the pass of Urrachree on 
the right, and that of Aughrim on the left, 

Urrachree was the weaker of these 2 passes. Though 
not affording room enough to be attacked by any army, it 
was approachable by more open ground than the other, and 
partly assailable by regular cavalry movements. On its inner 
flank, it was well enough secured by the adjoining slope of 
Kilcomedan, and the portion of the central morass com- 
m-encing there. On its outer flank and rear, it was bounded 
by steep hills and bogs. Through the firm or open ground 
about and in front of Urrachree, the little river already men- 
tioned ran into 4 different streams, ere it flowed into the 
beginning, on that side, of the morass before Kilcomedan. 

The pass of Aughrim, upon the left, was, on its inner 
flank, closer than Urrachree to Kilcomedan. On its outer 
flank and rear, it was more strongly, or rather completely 
covered, by '' a large red bog, almost a mile in breadth," 
which, commencing considerably in advance of Kilcomedan 
and Aughrim, remotely terminated at some steep hills behind 
both. \n front, the road to Aughrim lay between two adja- 
' Story, Cont. Hist. p. 121 & 2 



THE GREEN BOOK. 297 

cent and opposite projections of the central morass and the 
large red flanking bog — these projections, on their first 
approach, farthest away from Aughrim, affording but a small 
intermediate portion of firm ground for the highway to that 
place — then gradually receding so as to leave a considerably 
wider and almost circular space of firm ground on both sides 
of the highway — and finally, after this expansion of the firm 
ground, contracting it so as to give it the appearance of a 
sort of long and narrow neck proceeding from a round bottle 
— this last narrow neck of land, and the road xwxmmg through 
it, constituting the defile leading to Aughrim and Kilcomedan, 
particularly known as " the pass of Aughrim." At the very 
top of this narrow neck, or only regular approach to that side 
of Kilcomedan and the village of Aughrim, the little river, 
whose overflowings created the central morass before Kil- 
comedan, ran out of the morass, across the road, into the 
opposite flanking line of the *' large red bog." 

A short way after crossing this small river, an ancient 
stronghold of the O'Kellys, called the Castle of Aughrim, 
stood on the right hand of a traveller coming along the road 
cut of the defile towards Aughrim and the foot of Kilcome- 
dan. This Castle, though then but *' an old ruinous build- 
ing, with some walls and ditches about it," was of consi- 
derable importance, from its serving to command the way 
out of the pass of Aughrim towards the firm ground at the 
bottom of Kilcomedan, and the open country beyond — the 
road being within only 30 yards of the walls, and, at one 
place, so narrow, that but 2 horsemen could ride abreast 
upon it, " and that too with great difficulty."^ 

The Irish camp occupied, between the chnrch of Kil- 
comedan on its right, and that of Gourtnapory on its left, a 
line of about 2 miles, along the north-eastern ridge of Kil- 

^ Story, Cont. Hist. p. 122 — IM, passim. Harris, p. 324, &c., with 
his engraved plan of the field of xAughrim at p. 267 of his work. Mackay, 
ap. Dalrymple, vol. iii. p. 159, &c. — Extract from the Rev. Caesar 
Otway's Tour in Connaught, in the Literary Gazette of Sept. 28th, 
1839, p. 616 & 17. The recent local observations of this last intelligent 
traveller have been of considerable use to my humble attempt to convey 
a clear geographical and military idea of the Irish position, of which, 
however, the engraved plans of Story and Harris will necessarily give a 
much better notion to a reader than any merely verbal description. Yet, 
in the various narratives of the battle of which I make use, there are 
different local particulars, respecting which even those plans are unsatis- 
factory. 

25* 



298 THE GREEN BOOK. 

comedan ; and to the great natural advantages of the site he 
had selected for a defensive field of battle — than which Ire- 
land, perhaps, could not furnish a better^ — the French com- 
mander added all the artificial improvements that military 
experience and sagacity could suggest. From the front of 
his camp and 2 Danish forts on that side of the hill, to the 
border of the central morass below — a distance of about 
half a mile — there were, along the verdant slope of the emi- 
nence, a great many small enclosures formed by parallel 
rows of white-thorn hedges, which partly remain to the 
present day. — Between these hedges and ditches St. Ruth 
caused such communications to be made from one to an- 
other, as would enable troops occupying them, at once to 
assist each other with the greatest facility, and to take a 
body of assailants, advancing from one hedge to the other, 
in flank, on both sides. ^ Behind the hedges and ditches he 
stationed his foot, of whom he had an inferior opinion ; his 
object in this disposition being, to compensate for the sup- 
posed deficiency of those troops in quality, and their actual 
inferiority in number, by the protection which he thus gave 
them from the enemy's musketry and superior artillery, — 
by the steadiness and confidence which the circumstance of 
taking aim from behind such coverts would naturally inspire 
— and by the extreme difliiculty with which he knew an 
entirely exposed enemy, however numerous and experi- 
enced, w^ould necessarily have to struggle, in endeavouring to 
penetrate, at any length, from one row of hedges to another, 
through several successive lines of fire, both in front and 
flank. With this excellent, and, as would seem, almost 
exclusive arrangement of the slope of the hill for the benefit 
of his infantry, the French commander also managed to 

1 " The Frenchman," says Mr. Otway, "determined to show here that 
he knew how to choose a good defensive battle-field; and certainly 
(speaking, as I confess I do, as a mere civilian,) I may say, that not in 
Ireland could a better position be selected. I have been," he continues, 
" at Waterloo, at CuUoden, at Oldbridge, — those great fields where the 
fate of religions, empires, and dynasties, were decided, and none of them 
can at all be compared to Kilcomedan !" 

2 Dalrymple, vol. iii. p. 160. It may be here remarked, (what will 
also apply elsewhere,) that as Dalrymple, in his narrative of this battle, 
cites no authorities besides Major General Mackay, but Story and the 
London Gazette, it is easy for any one who has read the two last (as I 
have) to see what particulars the Scotch historian has taken from the 
MS. of his veteran countryman, who was in the action. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 299 

secure the fullest and most efficient co-operation from his 
cavalry, that were deservedly reckoned the finest and most 
formidable portion of the Irish army. This he skilfully 
effected, by having cut and levelled, from the front of his 
entrenched camp at the top of Kilcomedan, several passages 
through the hedges, as far as the open ground along the 
morass below, in order that the Irish horse might charge 
down, when necessary, by those openings, to the support 
of their foot ; a choice and powerful body of cavalry being 
appointed to take post as a reserve, before the camp, and 
to the rear of the infantry of the centre, for that important 
service.^ 

On the right in the direction of Urrachree, where the 
ground was fitted for cavalry, parties of Irish horse were 
pushed forward as far as the pass of Urrachree, a good way, 
or *' about 300 yards," in advance of Kilcomedan, and situ- 
ated near a minor eminence between the 2 remotest branches 
of the little river, that flowed into the adjoining commence- 
ment of the morass, which ran along the whole of the Irish 
centre. Behind these cavalry outposts, the slanting ground 
leading up to Kilcomedan was intersected with ditches, and, 
farther back, strengthened with several intrenchments, made 
before the right extremity of the Irish camp, for its greater 
security in that quarter. The ditches behind the cavalry, 
or in the space between those outguards of horse and the 
fortifications of the camp, were, like the hedges along the 
centre of the hill, well manned with infantry, were con- 
nected by similar flanking communications, and were like- 
wise furnished with convenient openings for a strong re- 
serve-line of Irish horse to pour down from the rear to the 
assistance of their foot ; and the extreme reserve of this 
wing stretched as far back as the rear of Kilcomedan.^ 

On the left wing at Aughrim, a proper guard was stationed 
before the outward entrance of the defile, or last narrow neck 
of land which conducted to the Castle of Aughrim, and the 

' Compare Dalrymple, vol. iii. p. 161, and Story, Cont. Hist. p. 129 
& 130, with King James, vol. ii. p. 457 & 58. The Scotch author, 
writing from Mackay, calls the force (of horse) kept by St. Ruth about 
his person, (or, on the hill, behind the Irish centre or main battle,) " a 
strong body of troops ;" and King James, from whom they would also 
appear to have been numerous, characterizes them as ^' extream good !^^ 

2 See London Gazette, No. 2680, and King James, vol. ii. p. 456 ; 
and compare Story, Cont. Hist. p. 128 & 9, with his own, or Harrises 
plan of the field. 



300 THE GREENT BOOK. 

firm ground beyond, at the foot of Kilcomedan.^ The old 
Castle was next secured by Colonel Walter Burke, and his 
regiment of foot, with 2 pieces of cannon ; and some adja^ 
cent old walls, hedges and trenches, before and behind the 
Castle, were guarded by another regiment of infantry, and 
1 of dragoons, *' posted conveniently under cover," so as to 
''obstruct the passage" by their fire.^ In a hollow, still 
farther away behind the Castle, a large or 'Mnain body" of 
horse were stationed, in order to sweep round that building 
by the plains to their left, and fall upon any hostile artillery 
that might be brought up through the defile to bear upon 
the old edifice ; a ''broad way" being cut for this important 
circuitous manoeuvre, in which, from the strength and qua- 
lity of the cavalry employed to execute it, there v/as no 
doubt entertained of success, on their once being able to 
close with the enemy. ^ The remaining ground, to the left 
of an enemy's force coming up the defile, — or, in other 
words, the ground which extended from the Casde of Augh- 
rim along the interior line of the morass at the bottom of 
Kiicomedan, as far as the Irish centre, — was occupied by 
infantry, posted amongst hedges to hinder any attempt of 
the English to cross the morass there, for the purpose of 
disturbing the communication between the Irish left and 
centre. As an additional precaution against such an attempt, 
should the enemy be successful in crossing, St. Ruth, from 
his own station, in front of his camp and to the rear of his 
centre, had caused to be levelled whatever might obstruct 
the speedy march of "full battalions of foot and squadrons 
of horse" to any part of his whole line as far as Aughrim.* 
The rear of this wing extended in 3 or 4 lines a good way 
behind Kiicomedan, and a minor eminence and some houses 
about the foot of it; the principal Irish reserve being here, 
and being consequently stronger than that at the other more 
assailable point of Urrachree^ — perhaps because troops, till 
called into action, would be safer, than in the direction of 
Urrachree, from the effects of artillery — or perhaps from an 

^ London Gazette, No. 2680, & before, p. 367. 

2 MacGeoghegan, vol. iii. p. 462. Story, Cont. Hist. p. 122, 131, 
& 136. Letter of Major Robert Tempest, ap. Rawdon Papers, p. 352, 
353, 354 & 355. 

3 Major Tempest's Letter and Harris's plan. 

4 Id. ib. &c. 

5 See Harris's plan, and Story, Cont. Hist. p. 128. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 301 

idea, on St. Ruth's part, that, though the ground about Ur- 
rachree would require a larger reserve from its being more 
open, or '' fairest for the English,"^ the additional consider- 
ation of its being suitable for cavalry was sufficient to render 
a great reserve unnecessary, with such horse as the Irish 
had there. ^ 

To avail themselves of the full benefit of this position, 
the Irish army unfortunately wanted a sufficient number of 
cannon ; ^ a serious want, which, like so many others in 
this war, the French government so easily could, but would 
not, remedy.^ As it was, however, St. Ruth made the best 
use of the few guns he had, which amounted only to 9 field- 
pieces ; dividing them, exclusive of the 2 at Aughrim Castle, 
into 2 batteries. One of these was placed upon the right 
side of Kilcomedan towards Urrachree, to annoy the enemy's 
approaches in that quarter. The other was planted upon 
the left slope of Kilcomedan, towards Aughrim, in such a 
manner as, from the declivity, to pour a flanking fire over 
the central morass, into the enlarged and circuitous portion 
of the firm ground before the last defile leading up to Augh- 
rim — that expanse of ground being the spot where the Eng- 
lish would have to fix their batteries, and to form their final 
dispositions for attempting the morass in that direction, and 
forcing the Irish outguard, at the entrance of the pass con- 
ducting to the old Casde.^ St. Ruth had no artillery before 
his centre ; his plan there being, not to hinder the English 
from crossing the morass, which he could easily do, but to 
allow a sufficient number of their infantry over, where in- 
fantry alone could pass, and then, having drawn the enemy 
on towards the Irish camp and reserves at the top of the 
hill, to bear down upon the assailants with a combined force 
of horse and foot, on ground which he had so well selected 
and adapted for the action of both. By this plan, the French 
commander calculated on driving those English detachments 
into the morass, and annihilating them tliere^ before their 

' Mackay, ap. Dalrymple, vol. iir. p. 160. 

^ An inference of my own, but amply justified, as will presently be 
shown, by the conduct of the troops alluded to. 

^ Mackay, ap. Dalrymple, vol. iit. p. 157. 

* Lausun's field-train of 20 guns, which he brought to and from Ire- 
land, without using them any where in it, would have far more than 
supplied this deficiency. 

^ See Harris's plan, and before, p. 300, note 1. 



302 THE GREEN BOOK. 

cavalry could get round the bog to save them^ — a plan, the 
success of which would be such '*a heavy blow and great 
discouragement" to Ginckle's army, as to render his retreat 
or ruin inevitable. 

Such were the masterly arrangements of the French Gene- 
ral to compensate for the numerous advantages on the side 
of the invader, and engage his formidable force, with a fair 
prospect of victory. The Irish army — hitherto exaggerated 
by English and Anglo-Irish misrepresentation to 25,000, 
and even to 28,000 men^ — amounted, in reality, to no more 
than 15,000,^ of whom, according to the best calculations, 

^ Berwick's Memoirs, vol. i. p. 100, Mackay ap. Dalrymple, vol. in. 
p. 159, 160, 161. 

2 Story, Tindal, Harris, and Dalrymple (this last not purporting to 
write from Mackay) are the authorities for the first estimate of the Irish 
at 25,000 men, or at 20,000 foot, and 5,000 horse and dragoons ; and 
the London Gazette, No. 2680, and Burnet, swell the Irish army to 
20,000 foot, and 8,000 horse and dragoons! Ohe jam satis ! Yet this 
last exaggeration was, I find, what was given out, and believed on the 
Continent ! 

^ The comparative number of the Irish and English armies at Aughrim, 
according to Irish accounts, is luckily preserved by honest O'Halloran, 
who, writing in 1772, observes, "that, at the battle of Aughrim, 15,000 
Irish, ill paid and worse clothed, fought with 25,000 men, highly ap- 
pointed, and the flower of all Europe I" This assertion, according to 
the authorities he followed, he had ample means of verifying, being born 
in Limerick, (the Irish head-quarters,) in 1729, or but 37 years after 
the battle, a period when, and for many years after, numbers, even ex- 
clusive of his own father or grandfather, were alive in Limerick, and 
elsewhere in Ireland, who either served, or were the immediate con- 
nexions of those who served, in James's army. {Compare Introduction 
to Hist, of Ireland, part in. chap. y. p. 275, and Appendix, ii. p. 379, 
1st edit. 1772, with Ferrar's Limerick, p. 95, 96, 354, 355, 369 & 
370, &c.) The corroboration given to this statement of the entire Irish 
army at Aughrim by the small amount of the infantry there, according 
to the Royal Memoirs, — a work which O'Halloran never read ! — has 
been already seen, {before, p. 292, n. 2 ;) and the remarkable countenance 
which the same statement also receives from the most rational computa- 
tion that can be made of the Irish cavalry at the battle, will be rendered 
equally evident. In fact, if we consider that James's army at the 
Boyne, or when he had all Ireland, except Ulster, was only 20,000 men, 
or but 14,000 Irish and 6,000 French, it will be rather surprising how 
the Irish, after so many misfortunes, after being mostly confined for a 
year to eight poor counties, after being entirely forsaken by the French, 
alienated by their general's conduct at Athlone, and weakened by the 
6,000 men seduced from the national service by the traitor O'Donnell — 
it will seem rather surprising, I say, how, under such circumstances, the 



THE GREEN BOOK, 303 

11,500 were foot and 3,500 horse and dragoons;^ and their 
artillery, as already mentioned, was but 9 field-pieces. The 
English army — shamefully diminished by its own writers, 
and their servile transcribers, to less than 17 or 18,000, and 

Irish could muster any thing like so many troops in the field at Aughrim, 
as they had at the Boyne ! 

' The amount of the Irish cavalry compared with that of the infantry, 
at Aughrim, may be thus computed. The entire Irish cavalry esta- 
blishment was as follows, June 2d, 1690, just before the Boyne, or when 
the regiments were certainly in a better state than before xAughrim, and 
when we likewise have the last regular account of their numerical 
strength. Of horse, there were 8 regiments, viz., 1, The Duke of Tyr- 
connel's; 2, Lord Galmoy's: 3, Colonel Sarsfield's; 4, Colonel Suther- 
land's ; 5, Lord Ahercorn's ; 6, Colonel Henry Luttrell's ; 7, Colonel 
John Parker's; 8, Colonel Nicholas Purcell's, and 2 troops of Horse 
guards, (The Duke of Berwick's and Lord Dover's,) with I troop of 
horse grenadiers, (Colonel Butler's.) Of dragoons, 7 regiments, viz., 
1, Lord Dungan's; 2, Sir Neale O'Neill's; 3, Colonel Simon Lut- 
trell's; 4, Colonel Robert Clifford's; 5, Sir James Cotter's; 6, Colonel 
Thomas Maxwell's; and 7, Lord Clare's, (O'Brien's). Story rates the 
8 regiments of horse, with the 3 troops of horse guards, at 3,471, and the 
7 regiments of dragoons at 2,480; making in all 5,951. The whole of 
the Irish horse and horse guards being, as appears, 3,471, by deducting 
the 3 troops of the latter — of which Berwick's and Dover's were 200 
each, Butler's 60, and the three, 460 — there will remain 3,011, which, 
divided by 8, the number of the horse regiments, it;/// ^/i-e 376 /or every 
Irish HORSE regimen.t. The whole of the Irish dragoons being 2,480, 
that total, divided by 7, the number of the dragoon regiments, will give 
2b^ for each Irish dragoon regiment. But, according to the statement 
of Colonel Walter Burke, who was taken prisoner in the castle of Augh- 
rim, there were 8 regiments of Irish cavalry absent from the battle, 5 
of which w^ere stationed in Limerick, and 3 in Galway. Now, taking 
4 of these as horse and 4 as dragoon regiments, and deducting them from 
5,951, the gross amount of the Irish cavalry, there would remain but 
3,031 to be present at Aughrim. Tabularly, the entire, according to the 
foregoing remarks and Story's numbers, would run thus : — 

regiments absent from IRISH CAVALRY ESTABLISHMENT 

AUGHRIM. j IN 1690. 

4 regts. of horse at 376, 1 ,504 8 regt. horse, at 376, 3,011 

4 do. dragoons, at 354,. ... 1,41 6 3 troops, guards, 460 

7 regts. dragoons, at 354,. . . .2,480 



Total men & horses absent,. 2,920 



j Total Irish Cavalry, 5,951 

I Deduct 8 cavalry regts. absent 
from Aughrim, 2,920 



Cavalry at Aughrim, as above 
estimated, 3,031 



304 THE GREEN BOOK. 

never made higher than 20,000 men' — was estimated by 
Irish honesty and fairness at only 25,000, or considerably 
less than what, after every allowance for non-effectives, it 
MUST have been ; Ginckle's actual force, ^ when perfect — and 

By this calculation — thus based on the Irish testimony of Colonel Burke, 
combined with the latest numbers supplied by the minutest English 
writers on the subject — such would be the amount of the Irish horse 
and dragoons at Aughrim ; for to the mere vague name of regiments in 
the Rawdon Papers, including some, elsewhere unmentioned, and others, 
affirmed by Story to have been actually disbanded 15 months before the 
battle of Aughrim — no arithmetical data are attached, and consequently 
no numerical estimate can be deduced from them. As the Irish, how- 
ever, rated themselves as 15,000 men, I take King James's words "about 
1 1,000," as applied to the infantry, to mean something more than 11,000, 
or say 11,500, and consider the remaining or cavalry portion of the army 
to be 3,500 ; the most probable estimate, if the great difficulty and ex- 
pense of levying cavalry be duly allowed for. Moreover, the Duke of 
Berwick, after the battle of the Boyne, or a year before, makes the Irish 
cavalry in the field about 3,500, and a similar allowance will appear 
ample at Aughrim, on reflecting that that number (and it was barely 
that) had to endure the " wear and tear" of a hard year's subsequent 
service — that it could be regularly recruited for Aughrim only from 
eight exhausted counties, or Limerick, Clare, Kerry and Connaught, in 
which the gentry's horses had to be seized upon — and, in fine, that even 
such means of mounting the men were still so insufficient, that several 
of the horses upon which the poor fellows rode in the battle could only 
be obtained from the English themselves, by the daring and incessant 
stratagems of the patriotic Rapparee. {Story, Imp. Hist. p. 97 & 98 ; 
Cont. Hist. p. S\, Si & 5, atid before, p. 213, note,- Rawdon Papers, 
p. 359 & 360 ; Berwick's Memoirs, vol. i. p. 76 & 79.) 

^ Story, (whose incomplete account of William's regiments at Augh- 
rim, at only 27 of foot, 18 of horse, and 4 of dragoons, would never- 
theless give Ginckle 25,959, or, with a deduction of 120, hereafter 
accounted for, 25,839 men,) makes the English force at the battle not 
17,000 horse and foot ! Tindal, whom Harris evidently copies as being 
somewhat less glaringly improbable than Story, states Ginckle's army at 
" not above 18,000 effective men !" Burnet says " not above 20,000," 
being so far fairer than the rest ; and he is followed by Macpherson. So 
much for such mere assertion and repetition ! 

2 There were, as has been already seen from Story, 67 regiments in 
Ireland in 1691 — viz. 42 of foot, 20 of horse, and 5 of dragoons. De- 
ducting from 67 all the regiments and detachments that are specified 
not to have been at Aughrim, the remainder will, of course, give us the 
real amount of the English forces that were there. The absent regiments 
of FOOT were the following: — 1, Princess Anne's; 2, Sir John Han- 
mer's ; 3, Major-General Trelawney's ; 4, Colonel Hastings' ; 5, Colonel 
H?i!'^s's; 6 & 7, a Brandenburgh and a Danish regiment, (all in the 
county of Cork;) 8 & 9, Colonel Michelburne and Venner's, (in Ulster;) 
10 & 11, Colonel Lloyd's and Lieutenant-General Douglas's, (in gar- 



THE GREEN BOOK. 305 

it was lately put into the best condition, — consisting of 51 
or 52 regiments, of which the foot, as rated at 28 regiments, 

rison at Athlone ;) 12, Lord Drogheda's, (in garrison at MuUingar, Bal- 
lymore, Tyrrel's Pass, Tecroghan and Philipstown ;) and 13 & 14, two 
anonymous regiments at Ballinasloe, (which, from Harris, I would sup- 
pose to be those of old Major General Mackay and Lieutenant General 
Scravenmore, both of whom were at Aughrim) — of horse and dra- 
goons, there were 2 regiments absent, namely, 1, Colonel Coy's, of 
horse, and 1, Colonel Matthews's, of dragoons, (both likewise i^i the 
county Cork,) making, in all, 16 absentee regiments. In a tabular and 
arithmetical form, (which the reader is invited to compare with p. 215 
and note 2,) the whole will stand thus — omitting a petty detachment of 
2 troops, (or 120 men, exclusive of officers,) from Conyngham's and 
Wynne's dragoons, absent with Colonel Michelburne in Sligo, and not 
worth introducing into the following table, as only tending to disar- 
range it. 

ABSENT REGIMENTS, REMAINING RECIPIENTS. 

14 regis, foot at 705, 9,870 i 28 regts. foot at 705, 19,740 

1 do. Aorse at 286, 286 | 19 do. /iorseat286, 5,434 

1 do. c?r6'^oo/25 at 444,. . . . 444' 4 do. c?ra^oo?25 at 444,. . 1,776 

16 regis, absent 10,600 51 regts. at Aughrim, 26,950 

51 do. G^Aughrim, 26,950:16 do. absent, 10,600 



67 regts. in 1691 37,550 | 67 regts. in 1691, 37,550 

That this number of 26,950 — or, allowing for the two absent troops of 
dragoons, above 26,800 men — thus deduced from Story's own data, 
would be even rather under than over the mark, will appear from the 
subjoined list of regiments, carefully compiled from a minute comparison 
of Story himself, with the account of Ginckle's regiments at Aughrim, 
as given in the Letter of Major Robert Tempest, amongst the Rawdon 
Papers ; and a list, by the way. which would show, that more regiments 
than Story mentioned tuere in Ireland. 

Regiments of Infantry, Horse, and Dragoons in the English Army, 
at the Battle of Aughrim, Sunday, July I2th, 1691, under Lieu- 
tenant General Baron de GincMe, and the Duke of fVirtemberg, 
Foot. 1, Major General Kirk's; 2, Colonel Gustavus Hamilton's; 
3, Lord George Hamilton's ; 4, Colonel Herbert's ; 5, Brigadier Sir 
Henry Bellasis's; 6, Colonel Brewer's; 7, Brigadier Stewart's; 8, Co- 
lonel Earle's; 9, Colonel Tiffin's; 10, Colonel Creighton's ; 11, Colonel 
St. John's ; 12, Lord Lisburn's ; 13, Lord Meath's ; 14, Colonel Foulke's ; 
15, Lord Cutts's ; 16, Major General Count Nassau's ; 17, Brigadier the 
Prince of Hesse Darmstadt's; 18, Brigadier La Melloniere's, (or Milli- 
neer's;) 19, Colonel Groben's, (or Gribong's;) 20, Colonel Belcassel's; 
21, Colonel Cambon's; 22, a regiment marked as "late (Colonel) Ham- 
bleton ;" and 6 Danish regiments ; the whole thus making 28 foot regi- 
ments. 

HoRSE. 1, Earl of Oxford's ; 2, Brigadier Villers's ; 3, Colonel Lang- 

2^ 



306 THE GREEN BOOK. 

would, in round numbers, be between 19 and 20,000, — the 
horse at 19 or 20, and the dragoons at 4 regiments, 7,000, — 

ston's; 4, Major General Ruvigny's ; 5, Colonel Sir John Lainer's ; 
6, Colonel Byerley's ; 7, Colonel William Wolseley's ; 8, Major Gene- 
ral La Forest's; 9, Colonel Donep's, (or Donop's ;) 10, Colonel Sche- 
scad's, (or Schested's ;) 11, Colonel Bohcour's; 12, Lord Portland's, 
(Guards;) 13, Colonel Monpouillan's, (Monopovillan or Montpelian's;) 
14, Lieutenant General Baron de Ginckle's ; 15, Brigadier Schack's ; 
16, Colonel Reidesel's; 17, Colonel Nienheuse's ; 18, Colonel Rheite- 
ren's ; 1 9, Colonel Fuon's, (or Jewell's ;) and 20, Major General Zule- 
stein's. 

Dragoons. 1, Brigadier Eppinger's ; 2, Brigadier Levison's ; 3, 
Colonel Sir Albert Conyngham's ; and 4, Colonel Wynne's. 

NUXERICAL RECAPITULATIO:jf. 

28 regiments oifoot at 705 each 1 9,740 

20 regiments of horse at 286 each 5,720 

4 regiments of dragoons at 444 each 1,776 



52 regiments at Aughrim, 27,236 

Deduct 2 troops of dragoons in Sligo, or, 120 



27,116 



Amply recruited and excellently appointed in every way as Ginckle's 
army were, — consisting of all the disposable regulars in the kingdom, as 
the preservation even of Dublin was left to militia, — favoured, moreover, 
by very warm, healthy weather, — undiminished, according to their own 
accounts, by any serious loss of killed and wounded, in their short period 
of active service, from June 7th to July 11th, — and, in fine, relieved from 
making any more detachments, than have been particularized, by a "very 
active militia'^ of above 12,000 men, and an absent reserve of 10,600 
regulars, or more than 22,600 men in all — it is quite manifest, even after 
allowing for any loss at Ballymore and Athlone, which may have been 
suffered and concealed, how extremely fair and moderate the Irish were 
in making such a force as that at Aughrim, no more than 25,000 men ! 
The modest caution and veracity of the Irish estimate likewise forms a 
highly honourable contrast with the discreditable English exaggeration 
of only 15,000 Irish, to 25 and 28,000 men, accompanied by the equally 
unfair diminution, to less than 17 or 18,000 men, of Ginckle's army, 
that has been completely demonstrated, even from English documents 
themselves, to have been 9,000 men 3iore than either of those state- 
ments. But, without such history as this, it would be impossible to 
make the Irish appear to have ''always fought badly at home!" — 
{Compare Story, Cont. Hist. p. 56, 58," 64, 71, 72, 75, 77, 81, 82, 86, 
110, Engraved Line of Battle between p. 124 Sf 125, p. 126, List of 
Killed and Wounded between p, 138 c^ U\,p. 316 c^ 17— Imp. Hist, 
p. 95, 96 6f 97. Harris, /?. 31 1, 313, c^c. Account of the Transactions 
in the North of Ireland, A. D. 1691, p. 2. Rawdon Papers, p. 356- 
359, Dutch Accounts, Sfc.) 



THE GREEN BOOK. 307 

and the whole, after every reasonable deduction, not less 
than 26 or 27,000 men. Their artillery is specified by 
one of their own officers at 12 pieces of cannon.^ 

This army was, moreover, composed of the choicest 
troops and the ablest leaders that Dutch assiduity and Eng- 
lish gold could procure, both at home and abroad. In addi- 
tion to some of the finest British regiments, it consisted of 
French Protestant veterans, trained to war in Louis XIV's 
service, when considered the first military school in Europe, 
and whose hatred to that monarch for their impolitic banish- 
ment in 1685 was so great, that the aid of their valour and 
experience w^as eagerly sought for by every power hostile 
to France^ — of Dutch, then deservedly celebrated for their 
excellent discipline and steady courage — of Germans or 
Hessians, under their Prince, a race of mercenaries, of 
whom it may be said, in the words of the poet, that " war 
was their sport, and plundering was their trade"' — and, 
lastly, of Danes, upon whose martial character it is ne^adless 
to pronounce any eulogium, and whose auxiliary force pre- 
sents the names of some of the very best regiments of the 
Danish monarchy; including the King's Foot Guards, the 
Queen's Regiment, and others belonging to the Danish 
princes of the blood. ^ In fine, in numbers, artillery, pay, 
equipments, confidence from past success, and every thing 
but strength of position and natural bravery, the superiority 
of the English was altogether enormous. Yet St. Ruth, by 
the skilful dispositions he had made, calculated on being 
able to counterbalance all this superiority; and, with the 

^ Major Robert Tempest {ap, Rawdon Papers, p. 352) is the only- 
writer who gives the amount of the English artillery in the action. 

2 Marshal Saxe, contrasting the degenerate state of discipline in the 
French army in his time with what it had been, observes — " I have 
heard many veterans say, that some of them had turned out very good 
General Officers, no longer than 30 or 40 years ago; and i\idX at the 
Revocation of the Edict of Nantz, in the year 1685, many of those that 
then quitted the service, were employed as General Officers in foreign 
services /" It was almost as comfortable to have such French specimens 
of the '^British heart and the British arm" at Aughrim, against the Irish, 
as it was to have 2 out of 3 Irish specimens of the same heart and arm 
at Waterloo, against the French ! 

2 As, for instance, Prince Christian's and Prince Frederick's regi- 
ments. {Story, Imp. Hist, p, 96, 6f Rawdon Papers, p. 357.) The 
Danes, w^ho, according to the treaty between their King and William, in 
1689, were 7,000 men, are described as " lusty fellows, well clothed and 
armed." More representatives of the heart and arm ! 



308 THE GREEN BOOK. 

MEN he had to second those dispositions, he required only 
the neutrality of Fortune to be able to do so. 

Ginckle, on surveying the situation of the Irish army, 
and comparing it with his map of the ground, saw the ne- 
cessity under which he lay, of attacking a position which 
directly crossed his march to Galway,^ and yet perceived 
the hazard of doing so, from the difficult nature of the place, 
and the remarkable wisdom of St. Ruth's defensive precau- 
tions.^ At last, " considering he was advanced so far," ob- 
serves a Williamite writer, "that he must either fight his 
way through, or retreat with loss and disgrace,"^ he resolved 
to approach the Irish more closely, next morning, in battle 
array ; though, in this movement, he designed rather to 
make a nearer and more accurate inspection of St. Ruth's 
force and position, and to be at the same time prepared for 
any consequences that might arise from such a proceeding, 
than to positively commit himself to a decisive engagement.* 
With these views, orders were given out that night through 
the English camp, "for the army," says William's historian, 
"to advance the next day, and for all (except 2 regiments 
left to guard the baggage) to be early under arms, without 
beat of drum, — no baggage to stir, — no tents to be removed, 
—-their arms to be fixed and clean, with a proper quantity 
of ammunition, — and the grenadiers to be drawn up to the 
right and left of every regiment, with 2 shells apiece, — and 
5 pioneers to be at the head of each battalion, w^hen called 
for."^ " The word that night," adds the English account, 
"was Dublin." 

As the advance of the invaders was visible at a consider- 
able distance from the top of Kilcomedan hill, St. Ruth, 
from the time the enemy appeared in sight, kept the Irish 
army drawn out to the best advantage, in 2 lines in front 
of his camp, to show Ginckle he was resolved to fight him.^ 
And now that every thing indicated the long-expected and 
approaching conflict, the French General availed himself of 



1 London Gazette, No. 2680, and French and Dutch accounts. 

2 Story, Cont. Hist. p. 122. Dairy mple, vol. iii. p. 158. 
s Harris, p. 324. 

^ Major Robert Tempest, in RawdoR Papers, p. 355. King James, 
vol. II. p. 457. 

5 Harris, p. 324, as abridged from, and slightly modified according to, 
Story, Cont. Hist. p. 123. 

6 Mackay, ap. Dalrymple, vol. in. p. 1 59. Harris, ut sup. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 309 

SO appropriate an occasion, to suggest such topics, in an 
address to his officers, as he judged would be best adapted 
to make a deep impression, through them, upon the minds 
of the Irish soldiery. He is stated to have commenced his 
harangue, by adverting to those military achievements per- 
formed by him on the Continent against the enemies of their 
religion, for which he was specially selected and sent over 
to command the Irish army, in preference to so many other 
good officers. He laid before them the great importance 
of the struggle which was now on the eve of taking place, 
for the liberty of their oppressed country, and the support 
of their persecuted religion ; a struggle, in which, next to 
the assistance of Heaven, and his own conduct as their 
General, the reliance of every member of their common 
faith throughout the world was placed upon the national 
courage. He mentioned,, that though since he arrived 
amongst them, things had not turned out as he would have 
wished, it was still in their power to retrieve the past, by 
betraying no want of proper resolution, in the cause of their 
religion and country. He remarked, that in the batde, 
which he was well informed, and which they must clearly 
perceive, that the army of the Prince of Orange w^as now 
fully determined upon, Irishmen, unlike the mercenary 
soldiers of that army, would not be fighting merely for pay, 
— but in defence of their lives, their wives, their children, 
their liberties, and their native land. He told them that 
noio, therefore, if ever, they should firmly resolve to make 
one grand effort for the recovery of their lost honour, privi- 
leges, and forefathers' estates, and for the restoration to his 
throne of their religious and legitimate sovereign. King 
James II., whose love, gratitude and liberality would be 
proportioned to such a signal service at their hands. ^ He 

^ A foreign contemporary periodical of eminence, speaking of the Irish 
in June, 1691, says: — " Le Roi Jaques, pour les encourager a bien 

faire, a fait publier une Declaration, dans laquelle il leur promet, 

que s'ils triomphent des x\nglois, non seulement ils entreront en posses- 
sion de tons leurs biens, mais qu'on partagera meme entr'eux les biens 
de leurs ennemis ; que des que le Roi Jaques sera retabli, ils jouiront de 
toutes sortes de privileges, sans en excepter la liberie d'elire les Mem- 
bres du Pariement, & leur Viceroy," &;c. — and, when James promised 
any thing, even his enemies allowed him to be a man of his word. It 
should also be recollected, that, but for the nefarious CromweUian usur- 
pation, still more nefariously confirmed by the Act of Settlement, or the 
Blacli Act, as the Irish called it, at least nine-tenths of Ireland belonged 

26* 



310 THE GREEN BOOK. 

particularly noted, that this, too, was the time to show, 
they were firmly resolved not to tolerate any longer the re- 
proaches of their enemies, who had branded them with the 
imputation of cowardice. He observed, that if they acted 
in this manner, he would take care to command them as he 
ought to do, while they would also gain the applause of 
every worthy member of their religion, for the great benefit 
such conduct would be to it, and the great injury to its ene- 
mies ; and would both secure to themselves the first of 
blessings here and hereafter, in the prayers of the Church 
for their welfare, and in the well-earned gratitude of their 
posterity !^ To these remarks he added, that the whole 
army should prepare themselves by confession for the great 
battle that was now at hand — a battle, in which, having re- 
solved, for his own part, to conquer or perish, and, as far 
as possible, to make others do the same, he had broken 
down 2 bridges in his rear, so that even those who were 
most deficient in courage would see the absolute necessity, 
under which they were placed, of acting like brave men 1^ 
To give the strongest effect to the purport of this address, 
St. Ruth had recourse not only to the exhortations of the 
Irish officers, but to the more important or spiritual agency 
of the Irish Catholic clergy, who then possessed — as they 
still possess — that extensive sway over the minds of their 
flocks, to which an undeviating career of piety and patriot- 

of right to the Irish or Catholic party which adhered to James against 
WilUam, and which James would, in consequence, have only been re- 
storing to the possession of what was their own, had he been enabled to 
act as he promised. 

* Story, Cont. Hist. p. 123-125. I have extracted from the address 
given by Story, the natural and probable substance of what St. Ruth 
would say — rejecting the grossly improbable language of vulgar boasting 
and bigotry in which the French General is certainly misrepresented, 
even in Story's own opinion, as having delivered himself. The address 
in question, which, it seems, was said to have been found amongst the 
papers of the deceased French General's deceased Secretary, both of 
whom only knew French, is any thing but what a genuine French 
document, or a translation from one, would be, and evidently nothing 
better than a low northern Irish version, or Orange corruption, of the re- 
ported substance of St. Ruth's harangue, disfigured with the same apo- 
cryphal and exaggerated rant against " heretics" and " heresy" as those 
Musgrave documents alleged to have been taken out of the pockets of 
dead papists in 1798, and, if ever taken outy we know by whom, and 
for what object, first written and put in, 

2 French and Dutch accounts. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 311 

ism has so naturally entitled them. And tJien^ as noz/;, the 
Irish priests nobly united the exercise of their political obli- 
gations as citizens with the discharge of their religious 
functions as clergymen, by exerting all the influence which 
they had over the minds of their countrymen, for the de- 
fence of their country — " animating them," says a British 
writer, *' by the most powerful of all human motives in time 
of danger, the interests of eternity !"^ 

These preparations for fulfilling the highest duty of man, 
through the aid of proper dispositions towards God, con- 

' Dalrymple, vol. iir. p. 158. O'Halloran has the following equally 
unanswerable and affecting remarks upon some other statements put 
forward by this Scotch writer, in order to represent the religious conduct 
of the Irish, previous to the action, in a fanatical or ridiculous light. 
" At the battle of Aughrim," says he, " Sir John Dalrymple tells us, 
that the priests ran up and down amongst the ranks, swearing some on 
the sacrament, encouraging others, and promising eternity to all, who 
should gallantly acquit themselves to their country that day. Does he 
mean this by way of apology for the intrepidity of the Irish, or to lessen 
the applause they were so well entitled to on that fatal day 1 Have 
they required more persuasions to fight the battles of foreign princes, 
than the native troops ; or are they the only soldiers in the world who 
require spiritual comfort on the day of trial ] I never thought piety was 
a reproach to soldiers ; and it was, perhaps, the enthusiasm of Oliver's 
troops, that made them so victorious. This battle was certainly a bloody 
and decisive one. The stake was great, the Irish knew the value of it, 
and though very inferior to their enemies in numbers and appointments, 
and chagrined by repeated losses, yet it must be owned, that they fought 
it well. Accidents, which human wisdom could not foresee, more than 
the superior courage of their flushed opponents, snatched from them the 
victory which already began to declare in their favour! Their boxes 
yet lie scattered over the plains of Aughrim ,♦ hut let that justice he 
done to their memories, which a brave and generous enemy never re- 
fuses /" With respect to the assertion, borrowed by Dalrymple from 
Burnet, that the Irish priests made their countrymen "swear on the 
sacrament, that they would never forsake their colours !" it is an equally 
malicious and stupid fabrication — Roman Catholics never converting 
their sacrament into the medium of an affidavit for w^orldly purposes — 
which cannot be said of Burnet's own church, one of the most pious of 
whose members, the poet Cowper, asks, in reference to the use which 
it has made of the sacrament, — 

Hast thou by statute shoved from its design 

The Saviour's feast, his own blest bread and wine, 

And made the symbols of atoning grace 

An office key, a picklock to a place. 

That infidels may prove their title good. 

By an oath dipp'd in sacramental blood ] 

A blot, that will be still a blot, in spite 

Of all that grave apologists can write ! 



312 THE GREEN BOOK. 

tinued till night descended upon the Irish camp ; in which 
alone we read of any such dispositions being attended to — 
" the English," says their own chaplain, Story, " being in- 
deed too remiss in point of devotion," and "not looking 
up to that Power, to which we are most indebted for all 
that we can pretend to that's good 1"^ 

The following morning Sunday, July 12th, 1 69 1 , Ginckle, 
at 6 o'clock, had his British, French, German, Dutch, Da- 
nish and Anglo-Irish troops, arrayed in 4 columns, to march 
and form in order of battle along the '' uneven, hilly 
ground" opposite the Irish position.^ They were to range 
themselves in 2 lines and 4 large divisions, each of these 
consisting of a front and rear division, under its separate 
commanders. Upon the extreme left or over against the 
Irish right on the side of Urrachree, were to be the Danish, 
Dutch, and some French cavalry ; the front division under 
?vIajor General La Forest and Brigadier Eppinger, and the 
rear division under Major General Holstaple (commander of 
the Earl of Portland's Regiment of Horse Guards) and Bri- 
gadier Shack. Next, to the right of these in front, were to 
be several regiments of Danish and Dutch, -and 2 of French 
infantry, under Major General Tettau and Brigadier La 
Melloniere ; and, behind these, more Danish, Dutch, and 

' Corjt. Hist. p. 125. This, indeed, was only to be expected from an 
army, whom Story elsewhere speaks of, as " in their practice defying the 
living God !" — and Dr. Gorge, Schomberg's chaplain, describes as gene- 
rally maintaining, " that religion is but canting, and debauchery the ne- 
cessary character of soldiers !" The reader will recollect the Orange 
inscription over the gates of Bandon, — 

*' Turk, Jew, or Atheist, 
May enter here, but not a Papist!" 

and the absence of religion in Harold's Saxon army, the night before the 
battle of Hastings. 

2 Story, Cont. Hist. p. 125 and 126, and Captain Robert Parker's 
Memoirs, p. .34. This last work (which, unluckily, I only met with by 
chance, when I had printed as far as the last sheet of this little essay) 
was written by an eyewitness, who served under Schomberg, William, 
and Ginckle. Harris has unfairly taken many particulars from the work, 
without a due acknowledgment ; evidently, as not wishing to direct at- 
tention to some circumstances in the book, that, with respect to the Irish, 
would be unsuitable to the views of mere Anglo-Irish, or Orange pre- 
judice. Fortunately, however, mi/ acquaintance with the honest Cap- 
tain is " better late than never," on account of the very great light which 
he throws on a part of the battle of x\ughrim, that has hitherto been a 
matter of obscure surmise and unsatisfactory dispute amongst historians. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 313 

one Hessian regiment of foot, under Major General Count 
Nassau, and Brigadier Prince George of Hesse Darmstadt. 
Then, to the right of these were to come the whole of the 
British and Anglo-Irish infantry ; the front under Major 
General Mackay, and Brigadier Sir Henry Bellasis ; and 
the rear under Major General Talmash, whose Brigadier, 
Colonel William Stewart, was absent from his regiment in 
Dublin, on account of his wounds, received at Athlone. 

Finally, the extreme right, opposite to the Irish at Augh- 
rim, was to contain the whole of the English and Anglo- 
Irish cavalry, and one French, or Ruvigny's regiment of 
horse ; the first division under Lieutenant General Scraven- 
more, and Brigadier Villers ; and the second under Major 
General the Marquis of Ruvigny, and Brigadier Levison.^ 
A thick fog, however, hung over the surrounding landscape, 
and retarded the advance of the British, from the circum- 
spection with which it was necessary to proceed in the face 
of an enemy. ^ 

Meanwhile, the Irish were getting ready to meet the Eng- 
lish, and St. Ruth caused the purport of his spirited ad- 
dress of the preceding evening to be again impressed upon 
the minds of the soldiery, who, as it was the Sabbath, were 
at divine worship, previous to the great engagement which 
was now at hand. The solemn rites of religion were ad- 
ministered with suitable exhortations to the different regi- 
ments by their respective Chaplains,^ but by one in parti- 
cular, whose heroic attachment to the cause of his country 
would, in the brightest periods of Greek and Roman glory, 
have given a halo of additional splendour to the noblest 
pages of Herodotus and Livy. This accomplished charac- 
ter, of whom the land of his birth and the order of which 
he was a member may be equally proud, was Father xllex- 
ius Stafford, of the honourable race of the Staffords of El- 
phin, in the county of Roscommon. In addition to his 
high and deserved reputation as a divine, Father Stafford 

^ StoFy, Cont. Hist, ut sup, MS. Letters of Prince George of Hesse, 
Brigadier Stewart, &c. 

2 Story, Cont. Hist. p. 123. Harris, p. 325. 

2 Secretary Davis's Letter from Dublin Castle, July 15, 1691, to Co- 
lonel John Michelburne. This writer, in his English way of describing 
the matter, mentions St. Ruth, as having " speecht them greatly in the 
morning, as also the priests the common soldiers, who," he adds, " also 
srave them absolution!" 



314 THE GREEN BOOK. 

was distinguished as a Doctor both of the Civil and Canon 
Laws ; his great abilities and virtue, alike admired by his 
sovereign and his countrymen, were rewarded with a Master- 
ship in Chancery, the Deanery of Christ Church, and a seat 
in Parliament; he was also Preacher to the King's Inns; 
and, when the war against the usurpation of the Prince of 
Orange broke out, he was appointed Chaplain to the Royal 
Regiment of Irish Foot Guards, consisting of above 1,900 
men.^ 

The Chaplain was worthy of the Regiment, which he ac- 
companied, through the whole course of its varied service, 
to the field of Aughrim. And "there^'^^ says the historian 
of the King's Inns, " the genius of his country triumphed 
over professional habits ; a peaceful preacher became a war- 
like chief; the awful ceremonies of religion were dispensed 
to a submissive flock, and their courage strengthened by an 
animating harangue. Then, with the crucifix in hand, Staf- 
ford passed through the line of battle, and pressed into the 
foremost ranks, loudly calling on his fellow-soldiers to se- 
cure the blessings of religion and property, by steadiness 
and attention to discipline on that critical day;" and '* suc- 
cess crowned these manly efi'orts, till death interrupted his 
glorious career." 2 Had the destiny of his unfortunate country 

'Imp. Hist. p. 97, and Cont. Hist. p. 31. Its full complement of 
men was 1,980 ; or 22 companies in all, and 90 men to each company. 
To know and remember such things may be useful. 

2 Duhigg's History of the King's Inns, p. 233, 238, 239 & 351, &c. 
lit sup. The following interesting description of the devotional pre- 
parations of Gustavus Adolphus's Protestant and Wallenstein's Catholic 
armies for the famous battle of Lutzen, in November, 1632, is given 
from a recent biography of the Swedish monarch, on account of the re- 
markable contrast presented between the conduct of Ginckle's and an- 
other Protestant army similarly situated, and the very curious coin- 
cidences observable between other circumstances of the two memorable 
engagements. After mentioning the beating of thereveillee by the drums 
of Gustavus's army the morning of the battle of Lutzen, (between which 
and Aughrim, by the way, there are several other resemblances besides 
those I have noticed,) the account thus proceeds: — "In a few minutes, 
the whole Swedish force, standing to arms, listened to the solemn service 
of devotion performed by the chaplains of the several regiments. By 
this time the morning had dawned, but its rays struggled feebly with the 
heavy fog As it was absolutely necessary to wait for the disper- 
sion of the mist before giving orders for an advance, the King com- 
manded the feverish interval of suspense to be employed in a general 
chant of Martin Luther's celebrated paraphrase of the 46th Psalm, 
commencing with 'God is our strong tower of refuge,' accompanied by 



• THE GREEN BOOK. 315 

been proportioned to the justice of her cause, the brow of 
Doctor Stafford would have been adorned with a mitre, or 
a cardinal's hat. As it is, his merit should not only be ca- 
nonized in the memory of his countrymen, but of every en- 
lightened admirer of patriotism and bravery, who, with the 
generous self-devotion of a Megistias at Thermopylae, and 
a Decius on the plains of Campania, should not fail to vene- 
rate the equally noble end of Doctor Alexius Stafford on the 
hill of Kilcomedan.^ 

the kettle-drums and trumpets of the whole army, followed by a hymn 
which he had himself composed, containing sentiments similar to thos^ 
expressed by the Psalmist." Then having stated, that the mist, alter 
this, was suddenly dispersed by the wind, the writer continues: — "The 
King of Sweden took advantage of the opportunity. After kneeling 
and devoutly repeating his accustomed prayer, ' O Lord Jesus Christ, 
bless our arms and this day's battle, for the glory of thy holy name,' he 
remounted his horse, and, with his drawn sword in his hand, rode along 

his front, addressing his soldiers He then gave the word of battle, 

* God with us.' Wallenstein had, in the mean time, been as urgent 

in his appeals to his soldiers ; and his exertions were ably seconded by 
the Bishop of Fulda, afterwards killed by a cannon-shot towards the 
close of the action, who presented himself in all parts of the field, hasten- 
ing from rank to rank with a crucifix in his hand, and exhorting the 
troops to acquit themselves manfully in defence of the Holy Catholic 
Church, and the honour of the Imperial House." {HoUing's Life of 
Gustavus Adolplius, p. 468-70.) Such are the elevated feelings and 
conduct, equally to be respected in Protestant and Catholic, and sublime 
even in the mere description, that the low sectarian rancour of Burnet, 
the shallow philosophy of Dalrymple, and the tasteless prejudice of their 
English and Anglo-Irish copyist, have attempted to ridicule the Irish 
for displaying at Aughrim I See also, in connexion with this subject, 
Mr. Lockhart's account of the interesting spectacle in the French camp, 
October 15th, 1813, the day before the battle of Leipsic. " Napoleon," 
says that gentleman, " having made all his preparations, reconnoitred 
every outpost in person, and distributed eagles, in great form, to some 
new regiments which had just joined him. The ceremonial was splen- 
did : the soldiers knelt before the Emperor, and in presence of all the 
line ; military mass was performed, and the young warriors swore to die 
rather than witness the dishonour of France. Upon this scene," adds 
Mr. Lockhart, " the sun descended, and with it the star of Napoleon went 
down forever!" {Hist, of Napoleon, vol. ii. p. 193 &, 4.) This is, 
indeed, described with equal elegance and feeling ; though how very 
differently would a British, but' more especially a Tor2/ writer, speak of 
the celebration of mass, before a battle, in Ireland/ Yet the cause of the 
Irish was at least as just as that of Gustavus Adolphus ; and the French 
Emperor was fighting to conquer other countries, while the Irish were 
only striving to keep their own ! 

^ Megistias, the Acarnanian, was the priest or diviner of the Greeks 
at Thermopylae, whose fate, according to Herodotus, he predicted. On 



316 THE GREEN BOOK. • 

The English forces remained under arms till about 12 
o'clock, without making any movement towards a direct 
attack on the Irish. The fog then rolling away before the 
meridian sun, orders were issued to march forward ; Ginckle 
himself advancing with a guard to reconnoitre the Irish posi- 
tion as accurately as possible, and sending on sufficient de- 
tachments, to clear the rising grounds in front from the Irish 
out-scouts. They drew back to within half a mile of their 
camp; by which the Dutch General was enabled to ascend 
a high hill to the Irish right, and thus obtain a better idea, 
than he had yet been able to form, of the manner in which 
the Irish w^ere posted. Upon this survey of St. Ruth's pre- 
cautions for his reception, Ginckle perceived the danger of 
commencing a general attack, especially as his cannon had 
not come up ; yet, for the present convenience and security 
of his army in their advance, and to try the spirit of his op- 
ponents, he commanded a Danish Captain and 16 horse to 
force the pass of Urrachree, on the right of the Irish, and 
where they had stationed a little outpost. The Danes 
pushed forward; but, notwithstanding the good conduct of 
their officer, and the immediate vicinity or inspection of 
Ginckle himself, they did not venture to encounter the shock 
of the Irish, but abandoned their Captain — running away, 
says the English annalist, ''from a less number than them- 
selves."^ Ginckle then directed 200 of Sir Albert Conyng- 
ham's dragoons to advance to some ditches, near a ford over 
one of the 4 branches of the little river covering the Irish 

being allowed by Leonidas to depart with all the Greeks, but the Spar- 
tans, he magnanimously refused to do so; contenting himself with send- 
ing away his only son, and remaining to perish with the Spartan king 
and his gallant countrymen. Simonides, the poet, raised at Thermo- 
pylae to the memory of Megistias, who was his friend, the following in- 
scription, near the monument erected to the Spartans; — 

By Medes cut off beside Sperchius' wave, 
The seer, Megistias, fdls this glorious grave : 
Who stood the fate, he well foresaw, to meet, 
And, link'd with Sparta's leaders, scorn'd retreat ! 

The conduct of the Consul Decius is sufficiently known. The auspices 
taken before a battle against the Latins, and the event of the combat, 
B. C. 337, are related to have destined him to death, in order to obtain 
victory for Rome ; and he devoted himself accordingly in the engage- 
ment ; thereby inspiring the Romans with such courage, that the Latins 
were entirely routed. {Herodotus, vii. 219, 221, 228. Livy, viii. 9.) 
' They, however, *' retrieved their honour afterwards," says Story. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 317 

right, for the purpose of hindering the Irish from crossing 
by that passage. It was now about 2 o'clock, and more and 
more of the Anglo-Dutch army continued to arrive at the 
scene of action. Their General, nevertheless, was still averse 
to an engagement ; yet, seeing the necessity of gaining the 
ford and other passes to the enemy's right, in case a decisive 
assault should turn out to be expedient, he commanded 
Conyngham's dragoons to cross the ford against a party of 
the Irish on the other bank — though with positive orders 
merely to drive off that party, and not to advance farther ; 
for fear of compromising him, by forcing him into a battle. 
The Irish, on their side, had prepared to decoy the 
enemy into this very advance, apprehended and provided 
against by Ginckle. To the rear of their cavalry outpost 
at the ford, they had placed an ambuscade in a bog, towards 
which the outpost, after a volley, was to retire, on the ap- 
proach of the English dragoons. The party in ambush 
were then to assail the pursuers — while the retiring outpost 
were to make towards a hill nearer their camp, behind 
which and the house of Urrachree considerable reinforce- 
ments were stationed ; and all these joining, while the dra- 
goons would be held in check by the ambuscade, were to 
fall upon them, under the disadvantage, in any event, of 
their being weakened and disordered by being obliged to 
dismount, to engage those in ambush with proper effect. 
The plan was as successful as it was well arranged. The 
Irish outguard, after a volley in answer to that of the Eng- 
lish dragoons, gave way to draw them on to the ambush. 
The dragoons, enticed into a breach of orders by this arti- 
fice, instead of merely taking possession of the side of the 
ford abandoned by the Irish, boldly continued to press for- 
ward in pursuit, till they reached the ambush, from which 
they were suddenly assailed by a discharge of musketry. 
Upon this, they betook themselves to the shelter of a hedge, 
where, a party of them dismounting, advanced against the 
ambush, and killed most of those who were there. But the 
turn of the Irish cavalry to attack was now come ; who, 
collecting their strength from behind the hill near their 
camp and the house of Urrachree, rushed down upon their 
late assailants, and forced them to retreat in disorder. 
Ginckle, seeing this, attempted a counter-movement to 
save his men from their own rashness ; sending Brigadier 
Eppinger's large Royal Regiment of Holland dragoons, 10 

27 



318 THE GREEN BOOK. 

companies or 920 strong, to rescue Conyngham's, by en- 
deavouring to cut off or get between the victorious Irish 
and their camp. The Irish, however, were not to be out- 
witted as their opponents had been ; but, discovering the 
enemy's design, obtained suitable assistance, and charged 
Conyngham's and Eppinger's united squadrons so vigor- 
ously, that they were confessedly *'too hard" for them. 
The *' greatest part" of the Earl of Portland's Horse Guards 
were then sent to second their comrades. That splendid 
cavalry regiment, which was 6 companies or 480 strong, 
and had but recendy arrived from England in the finest 
order, had only just come up ; and the detachment from it 
hastened forward to obey their orders, and behaved, as 
might be expected, with remarkable gallantry. But, in the 
endeavour to sustain their companions, they were roughly 
handled by the Irish, losing, says Story, " several men and 
horses in this part of the action." This cavalry combat, 
at first only a skirmish, gradually engaged a considerable 
number on both sides, as fresh parties were sent out from 
each, according to the emergency of the occasion. At 
length, after about an hour's fighting, or at 3 o'clock, the 
Irish horse resumed their first position on the other side of 
that branch of the litde river which '' flanked the right of 
their army," and across w^hich they had followed the Eng- 
lish ; the latter, as the attacking party, being consequently 
worsted — or driven over the ford andyVom the ground they 
had been allowed to gain only for a time, and occupying a 
position no more advanced at the end than at the beginning 
of the conflict.^ 

^ Cont. Hist. p. 114, 126, 127; Major Robert Tempest, ap. Rawdon 
Papers, p. 353, & 355 ; List of the regiments in the English and Dutch 
services, with an account of their numbers and pay, in 1691, in a Dutch 
Life of William III. ; and MS. Letter of Colonel Richard Brewer, 
Ginckle's Governor of Mullingar, July 8th, 1691, (a worthy man and a 
good officer,) who, in his honest unlearned style, says of Lord Portland's 
GUARDS, " Major General Holsop's [i. e. Holstaple's] redgment is just 
now marcht by, which is in grate order !" The beating of about 1600 
cavalry, including the Guards, (or the " up-and-at-them" lads of that 
day,) and not only those troops, but w^hat Story vaguely calls other 
*' fresh parties sent out," is an affair, evidently so mortifying to the 
Williamite vanity of that WTiter, that the truth is rather to be screwed 
or studied out of his pardal narrative than obviously inferred from it. 
I also strongly suspect, it was on this occasion that Major General Hol- 
staple, the leader of those Guards, was slain by the Irish ; though, for 
an obvious cause, Story does not honestly and exactly say when he was 



THE GREEN BOOK. 319 

This success of the Irish against a far superior force' 
showed so much boldness and skill on their part, that it 
caused Ginckle to desist from a further prosecution of hos- 
tilities. And *« then," observes the English historian, '' our 
General officers coming together, began to consult whether 
it was fit to give the enemy battle that night, considering 
the disadvantages we were to expect in attacking them."^ 
Some, and, as it would appear, the majority of William's 
experienced commanders, were for putting off the combat 
until the next morning, at break of day ; an opinion at first 
so far assented to, that the English tents, though despatched 
early that mornincr alonor with the baofffao;e towards Ath- 
lone, were ordered to be brought back, and pitched for the 
night opposite to the Irish army.^ At last, however, it was 
proposed by Major General Mackay, that the batde should 
be continued, by endeavouring to outflank and assail, with 
such a large force, the Irish right at Urrachree, where the 
ground was most open or fairest for such an attempt, as to 
oblige St. Ruth to strengthen that wing with a great por- 
tion of his main reserve, and more particularly of his horse, 
from his other wing at Aughrim. By such a movement of 
the British left against the Irish right at Urrachree, it was 
argued, that the British right would be the better enabled 

killed, but merely mentions the circumstance generally, amongst other 
matters, at the end of Ginckle's "chance victory." {Cont. Hist p. 
138 & 140.) 

* See before, p. 300, and note 2, p. 301, and King James, vol. ii. p. 
457. The whole of the British cavalry were, in round numbers, (by 
my lowest estimate,) 7,000, or, more exactly speaking, 7090, allowing 
for Ihe detachments at Sligo ; the whole of the Irish, at most, only 
3,500, of which the greater part were on their centre and left. The 
English had as yet sent no horse against Aughrim ; so that, even allow- 
ing a considerable number of Ginckle's cavalry not to have come up in 
time for the affair at Urrachree — a delay, however, that would be less 
likely to occur with cavalry than with infantry — the assailants must 
have been much more numerous than those by whom they were re- 
pulsed. 

2 Cont. Hist. p. 128. 

s No tents were to be removed on the morning of the action, accord- 
ing to Ginckle's General Orders, the night before (ante^ p. 308) — he, 
however, commanded " all the tents and baggage," says Captain Par- 
ker, " to go back to Athlone," that very morning, {Memoirs, p. 34) — 
and now, the same tents were to be brought back, from such a distance, 
again ! Such vacillancy alone shows, more than whole pages of com- 
ment, the state of uneasiness and irresolution impressed upon the minds 
of William's veteran leaders by the posture and resolution of the Irish army. 



320 THE GREEN BOOK. 

to attack the Irish left at Aughrim, comparatively weakened 
as that strong post would be by the draughting of so many 
Irish troops to Urrachree ; and, during the time occupied 
by those detachments in their transverse march of about two 
miles from one of their wings to the other, an opportunity 
might be taken of sounding the marsh before Kilcomedan, 
and, if it should be found passable, of sending over suffi- 
cient infantry to attack the Irish centre ; thus giving an op- 
portunity to the whole English force to engage that of the 
enemy, which would otherwise be impossible.^ 

The debate between Ginckle and his officers continued 
from about 3 to half-past 4 o'clock, or an hour and a half — 
a period sufficiently indicating the fluctuation and perplexity 
of the assembly — till decision, though accompanied with 
danger, naturally becoming less intolerable than suspense, 
and the advice of the Scotch veteran being considered the 
most eligible in their situation, the Council broke up, with 
the resolution of continuing the battle. ^ 

The disposition of the British army was now considerably 
changed.^ A large body, or 15 regiments of their foot, col- 
lected in 2 lines, formed the centre before the morass in front 
of Kilcomedan ; though various regiments, according to the 
increased knowledge acquired of the nature of the ground, 
the opinion entertained of their aptitude for any particular 
service, the liberty of change allowed by the intervention of 
the bog, and the circumstance of the Irish being on the de- 
fensive, could be and were subsequently moved from the 
centre to the wings, and from the wings to the centre, in a 
manner quite different from what might be supposed by 
their mere position in the line of battle. The whole of the 
British and Continental horse and dragoons, stated at 49 

' Cont. Hist. 128 & 9, Mackay, ap. Dalrymple, vol. iii. p. 160, and 
King James, vol. ii. p. 457 — the last being the authority for the endeavour 
to outflank the Irish at Urrachree by outnumbering them. 

2 For the time occupied by the Council in their consultations, compare 
Cont. Hist. p. 129 & 30. 

2 Compare Story's " line of battle" already referred to and set forth 
(ante, jo. 312 <^ 313) and Major Robert Tempest's, (ap.Rawdon Papers, 
ut sup.) — the first of which, from its imperfection, by Story's own ac- 
knowledgment, (Cont. Hist. p. 126,) and from its not containing such a 
comparatively minute and satisfactory enumeration of regiments as the 
Major's, I have considered to be only a sort of marching outline of the 
disposition of Ginckle's force before the Council of War had decided upon 
the last measures for prosecuting the engagement. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 321 

squadrons, were occasionally interlined with some battalions 
of infantry, and were divided into 2 great bodies, to attack 
the Irish on the left and right, at Urrachree and Aughrim ; 
the cavalry on each of those wings, but especially on the 
side of Urrachree, being thus enormously superior in amount 
to the Irish horse and dragoons ; or almost as many on each 
wing alone, as the Irish had altogether, upon their right, left, 
and centre.^ The entire British force formed 2 lines oppo- 
site the Irish as before ; a great portion, however, of what 
was the second line being now the first appointed to engage ; 
if, indeed, the terms j^rs^ and second can be strictly used, 
where both lines were so soon compelled, as we are informed 
they were, to mingle together, in their attack upon the Irish. ^ 
The hostile Generals both possessed a good view of each 
other's army and position ; St. Ruth, of the British, from 
his station behind his centre on Kilcomedan hill, and Ginckle, 
of the Irish, from the grounds below,^ where he and his 
General Officers moved from place to place as appeared to 
be most expedient. Besides his own countrymen. Lieuten- 
ants General D'Usson and de Tesse — who could not, as 
foreigners, be so serviceable on this occasion as King James's 
native officers, — St. Ruth was seconded in the command of 
the Irish army by the brave and honest Sarsfield, (recently 
created Earl of Lucan,) Brigadier William Mansfield Barker, 
General of the Irish Infantry, Major General John Hamilton, 
Brigadier Gordon O'Neill, Major General Wilham Dorring- 
ton. Colonel of the Royal Regiment of Irish Foot Guards, 
and several other gallant officers.'* But the British, in addi- 

' See before, p. 319 and n. 1. There were 25 squadrons of horse 
and dragoons arrayed against the Irish on the Urrachree side, and 24. 
squadrons on the side of Aughrim ; these last at Aughrim, except Ru- 
vigny's French Horse, being all British or Anglo-Irish regiments. {Major 
Robert Tempest, ut sup.) 

2 Story, Cont. Hist. p. 128. ^ Personal information. 

^ Story, Cont. Hist. p. 55, 128, 137, 138, 145. London Gazette, No. 
2664, Berwick's Memoirs, vol. i. p. 97, and Hist, of William III. vol. ii. 
p. 57, — 3 vols. London, 1702. This history is anonymous, but, from the 
royal and noble personages to whom the different volumes are dedicated, 
and, for other reasons, it appears to be on several points a work of good 
authority — I mean as an English production. As regards the battle of 
Aughrim, it contains some very useful and elsewhere-unmentioned infor- 
mation, which Harris has 

plunder'd snug, 

And suck'd o'er all, like an industrious bug, 
without the slightest acknowledgment on his part ! 

27* 



322 THE GREEN BOOK. 

tion to their other great advantages over the Irish, enjoyed 
that of there being a perfect union and friendship between 
Ginckle and the many able Generals sent over by William 
to assist him with their counsel ; so that, if any accident 
happened to him, or to his next-in-command, the Duke of 
Wirtemberg, no fatal consequences could occur from an 
ignorance of the dispositions necessary for the continuance 
of the engagement;^ whereas St. Ruth — owing to the bad 
feeling he had provoked between himself and the principal 
Irish officers, but particularly on account of his unjust 
quarrel with his second-in-command, Sarsfield, — kept his 
whole plan of action to himself alone ; thus exposing the 
safety of Ireland to the mere chance, in his situation, of a 
single life.^ 

1 There is not, perhaps, a better illustration of the great benefits of 
such a good understanding as that between Ginckle and his General 
Officers than the case of the French at Salamanca, where, notwithstand- 
ing the fatal mistake of Marmont in the beginning of the day, which 
gave the victory to the English ; notwithstanding the additional misfor- 
tune of his being borne off the field at the very commencement of the 
action with a broken arm and 2 deep wounds in his side from a shell, 
and of General Bonet, the next in rank, being killed, Clausel, neverthe- 
less, made a most gallant fight, and saved the French army from the total 
destruction which must have ensued, had the French commanders been 
left in the same ignorance by Marmont, as St. Ruth's officers were in, 
after his death, at Aughrim. How very different from St. Ruth's was 
the wise conduct of William at the Boyne, who, though on such cool or 
jealous terms with Schomberg and the rest of his great officers as not to 
consult them on the formation of his plan of action, yet sent them, the 
night before, a copy of the requisite information on the subject ! {Napier'' s 
Peninsular War, p. 169, 171, 174, Sfc. Dalrymple, vol in./?. 29.) 

2 The subjoined extracts, the first and second of which are from the 
eminent Dutch periodical already cited — a work evidently conducted by 
one of those able Huguenot refugees who retired to Holland from Louis 
XIV's persecution — and the third from a military writer of high rank in 
Louis's service, throw a strong and original light upon the contrast be- 
tween the character of Ginckle and St. Ruth, upon the degree of blame 
to be attached to the latter for the loss of Athlone, and the effect which 
the consequent quarrel between him and Sarsfield had upon the fortune 
of the ensuing battle. The editor of the Dutch periodical, in assigning, 
after the capitulation of Limerick, the various reasons for the success of 
the English, and remarking, that " quand la bonne intelligence est jointe 
avec I'habilite des Generaux, il est impossible qu'ils ne reussissent," ob- 
serves — " Le General Guinckel, et tons les autres Officiers qui comman- 
doient sous lui, sont du consentement de tous ceux qui les connoissent 

de parfaitement habiles gens Mais I'intelligence, qui a regne 

parmi ces Generaux a pour le moins autant contribue aux heureux sue- 



THE GREEN BOOK. 323 

The arrangements for continuing the engagement against 
the Irish right at Urrachree being soonest completed, if not 
actually decided upon, before the council broke up, about 
half-past four Ginckle's forces were again in motion, and by 
five o'clock the batde recommenced. The Danish horse 
and some foot sloped away *' on the left of all," along the 
branch of the little river or " small brook" over which Co- 
nyngham's, Eppinger's, Portland's, and Ginckle's other 
cavalry detachments had been driven at the beginning of 
the day ; the object of this slanting movement of the Danes 
being to weaken the Irish by obliging them to stretch them- 
selves out so much on their right, that a considerable num- 
ber of their horse and dragoons would be prevented from 
giving any assistance elsewhere. To this object the Danes 

ces que leur propre habilite. M. de Guinckel n'est pas de ceux, qui 
n'ecoutent jamais ceux qui sont au dessous d'eux, et qui faisant tout a 
leur tete, estitneiit qu'ils ne doivent plus recevoir d'avis de personne. 
C'est un homme doux, honnete, qui ecoute tout le monde, & qui se 
rende facilement a la raison, sans pretendre de devoir I'emporter par son 
autorite, & par la poste qu'il occupe." Then, in reference to St. Ruth's 
and Sarsfield's quarrel at Athlone, the same author says — " On assure 
que les Generaux S. Ruth & Sarsfield eurent de grandes disputes sur 
ce sujet avant la bataille. Le dernier accusa I'autre de la perte d'Ath- 
lone, pour avoir neglige de marcher a son secours dans le temps qu'il 
le lui avoit dit : la division des Generaux divisa les troupes, et peut-etre 
que cette mesintelligence contribua un peu a la perte de la bataille. lis 
se dirent bien des duretez I'un a Tautre, & ils se menacerent meme re- 
ciproquement de se faire mettre aux arrets. S. Ruth avoit le comman- 
dement sur Sarsfield; mais Sarsfield avoit le coeur & I'affection des 
soldats. Ceux qui ont connu ce premier, comme je le connoissois, 
seront tentez de le lui donner le tort. C'etoit un homme difficile & 
imperieux, qui matinoit un peu ceux qui lui etoient subordonnez. Lors 
qu'il n'etoit que Colonel, plusieurs Capitaines ou Subalternes furent 
obligez de quitter son regiment, pour ne pouvoir pas vivre avec lui. 
Mais la mort a expie toutes ses fautes," &c. The third extract from the 
contemporary French historian (who was a Marquis, a Brigadier and 
Lieutenant General of Artillery in the French army, Lieutenant for the 
King in the Government of Auvergne, and a Knight of the Military 
Order of St. Louis,) says — " II y avoit de la mesintelligence dans I'armee 
Irlandoise ;" and then, after adverting to the " grandes disputes" above 
mentioned between St. Rath and Sarsfield, and likewise stating that "la 
division des Generaux avoit aussi divise les troupes," it is added, that 
" cela n'empecha pas qu'ils ne se disposassent a bien recevoir I'armee 
Angloise qui venoit les attaquer ; mais cette mesintelligence contribua 
beaucoup a la perte de la bataille." The " beaucoup" of this French 
Catholic historian will be proved to be much more true than the 
" peut-etre" and " un peu" of the Huguenot writer. 



324 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Strictly confined themselves ; merely remaining on their 
own side of the rivulet, without making any attempt against 
the Irish on the opposite bank.^ Next, on the right of the 
Danes, the three veteran French infantry regiments of Mel- 
loniere, Cambon, and Belcassel, amounting to between 2,100 
and 2,300 men,^ marched up against the ditches united by 
flanking communications as far as the entrenchments before 
the Irish camp, on that extremity of Kilcomedan. These 
ditches were all strongly lined by the Irish musketeers, 
sustained with due detachments of horse, by means of the 
artificial ways cut for the passage of cavalry from the main 
reserve of that force in the rear. The three French regi- 
ments made their assault with the firmness of veterans and 
the characteristic vigour of their countrymen, whose " pro- 
perty," observes Marshal Saxe, "it is to attack, and whose 
first shock is scarcely to be resisted. "^ And this assault 
was not made with more bravery by the French, than it 
was received with determination by the Irish, who, '' con- 
sidering," says King James, " that this was like to prove 
the last effort for re-establishing the King's authority, and 
secureing the estates and liberties of an oppressed people, 
expected them with great constancy, and convinced the 
French^ troops they had to doe with men no less resolute 
than themselves ; soe that never," adds the King, " was 

1 Story, Cont. Hist. p. 127, 134, & 135. King James, vol. ii. p. 457. 

2 Life of King William printed in Holland, vol. iii. p. 34, &c., and 
the above-mentioned anonymous History of William III., vol. ii. p. 
266, as collated with Story, Cont. Hist. p. 128 & 129. By a compa- 
rison with the English chaplain of the first and second of those author- 
ities, one or both of which are evidently based upon the testimony of 
Huguenot officers who were at Aughrim, I am enabled to illustrate a 
portion of the battle, which, though most honourable for the Irish, has 
hitherto remained in a state of obscurity, amounting to almost total 
darkness. The Dutch list of William's regiments for 1691, {see before^ 
note l,p. 318,) makes the full complement of Melloniere's, Cambon's, 
and Belcassel's three French infantry regiments 780 men each, or 2,340 
men in all. At 705 each, they would be 2,115. 

3 Reveries, or Memoirs concerning the Art of War, by Maurice Count 
de Saxe, Marshal General of the Armies of France, book ii. chap. vi. 
p. 186 & 7. The onset of the French has borne this character since 
the time of the Romans. 

^ King James, vol. ir. p. 457. The italicised word French is a 
slight change made in the royal text, owing to the circumstance of the 
troops who gave the onset, being not exactly "English," as the King 
calls them, but French^ though in English pay. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 325 

assault made with greater fury, or sustain'd with greater 
obstinacy, especially by the foot." Nor does the hostile 
language of religious and national antipathy bear a less 
powerful testimony to the gallantry of the Irish resistance. 
" Here," exclaims the English chaplain, " we fired one 
upon another for a considerable time, and the Irish behaved 
themselves like men of another nation, defending their 
ditches stoutly ; for they would maintain one side till our 
men put their pieces over at the other, and then, having 
lines of communication from one ditch to another, they 
would presently post themselves again and flank us."^ 
This spirited and stubborn conflict was kept up by the 
French and Irish among these hedges and entrenchments 
for an hour,^ or till about six o'clock, before the centre of 
each army and its other wing at Aughrim could engage, — 
except from the artillery, which played from both sides. 

Meantime, the movements of Ginckle's troops, for the 
various attacks designed against those points of the Irish 
position as yet unassailed, were going on ''in as good order 
as the inconveniency of the ground would allow ;" and St. 
Ruth, perceiving how very hard the inferior force on his 
right was pressed by the French, Dutch, and Danish infan- 
try and cavalry of the enemy, who were endeavouring by 
their superior numbers to outflank him, gave orders for the 
greater portion of the horse and some foot, that composed 
the second line of part of his left, or rather of his left-centre, 
towards Aughrim, to march to the relief of their companions 
at Urrachree.^ Upon this. Major General Mackay — to 

' Cont. Hist. p. 129. The English Parson's expression of " like men 
of another nation," in reference to the Irish, is not only too bad for the 
lay Orangism of Harris, but even for the more rabid or iithe'eating 
antinationality of Graham. 

2 I have corrected Story's " nigh an hour and a half," — v^^hich would 
postpone the general engagement to half-past 6, instead of about 6 in 
the evening, — by the opposite and unanimous testimony of Major Tem- 
pest, Capt. Dunbar, and Secretary Davis. The two first wrote their 
letters from what they knew, as being in the battle, and the third derived 
his information from the account of the engagement sent by Ginckle 
himself to the Castle. (Rawdon Papers, p. 349 6f 352, Account of the 
Transactions in the North of Ireland, A. D. 1691,j9. 11, 4" London 
Gazette, No. 2680.) 

" Compare King James, vol. it. p. 457, with Story, Cont. Hist. p. 
129. Mackay, {ap.Dalrymple, vol, iii. p. 159,) who speaks of" almost 
all" St. Ruth's horse as having been drawn from his left to his right, 
must be checked by Major Tempest (Rawdon Papers, p, 352-355) and 



326 THE GREEN BOOK. 

provoke or irxduce the French General to weaken himself 
still more on that side, and to place the issue of the contest 
as much as possible at Urracliree, where the ground was 
so much more favourable to the assailants — suggested to 
Ginckle, to draw a further detachment from his right; a 
movement which would be visible to St. Ruth from where 
he stood, and which might cause him to lessen his strength 
still more towards Aughrim, than the very superior force 
of Major General Talmash's wing, which was sent on 
against that pass, could be proportionably weakened by the 
amount of men drawn from it, considering the narrow 
ground by which it had to attack.^ Mackay and the other 
Generals at the same time caused the morass before Kil- 
comedan to be sounded ; and, it being found, though diffi- 
cult, yet not impassable, arrangements were also made for 
attacking the Irish centre and right, and thus bringing the 
whole British force to act with vigour.'^ Through the nar- 
rower part of the bog, nearer to Urrachree than to Aughrim, 
and where the ditches on the Irish side, or at the bottom of 
Kilcomedan hill, ran farthest into the marsh, 4 select infan- 
try regiments were to pass over first, and station themselves 
at those ditches ; and, lower down, or nearer to Aughrim, 
where the morass was much wider, and the passage conse- 
quently more difficult, another body of foot, more nume- 
rous than the former by several regiments, was likewise to 
cross. This second and stronger body, which was to sus- 
tain the first, was to subdivide to the left and right of the 
opening by which it was to get over. The left portion of 
it was to file into a corn-field towards the 4 regiments, first 
mentioned ; the right was to take possession of some 
rougher and more difficult ground and ditches ; and the 
whole, when so posted along the border of the morass, op- 
posite the Irish in the hedges, were to continue there with- 
out making any attempt to charge up the hill, until they 
should be supported by one another ; while Major General 

Captain Parker, {Memoirs, p, 34-35,) both of whom were engaged 
against the Irish left, and prove the fine reserve body of Irish cavalry, 
originally drawn up in the hollow plain behind Aughrim Castle, not to 
have been removed. It must therefore have been, most of the horse be- 
hind the Irish left-centre, rather than of those behind the extreme left, 
that were despatched to Urrachree. See before, p. 299 & 300. 

^ Mackay, ap. Dalrymple, vol. iii. p. 160. 

2 Id. ib. Cont. Hist. p. 129. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 327 

Talmash, with the British right wing of Cavalry, and some 
more infantry, should come round by Aughrim Castle, to 
give still greater aid to the advance of the entire, by assail- 
ing the Irish left in that direction.^ 

St. Ruth, on his side, contemplated those arrangements 
of the enemy with satisfaction ; well aware how very im- 
probable it was, that each of the British divisions, after 
crossing, could bear unmoved, till all should join, the close, 
constant and galling musketry with which it would be re- 
ceived at the edge of the bog, by his foot in the hedges ; 
and, from this plan of " divide and conquer" on his part, 
anticipating the destruction of the whole. Nor was this 
expectation of the French commander unjustifiable, since 
the pass by the Castle of Aughrim was in itself so narrow^ 
and such measures had been taken to strengthen it and the 
adjacent parts, that if properly defended, it would be impos- 
sible for the English horse to force their way through, for 
the purpose of assisting or rescuing their foot in the centre ; 
and the Irish infantry, besides being aided by their cavalry 
upon the hill, would afterwards, from thei* superior know- 
ledge and capabilities of acting in such intricate ground as 
the morass, possess incalculable advantages over the British 
and foreign foot, when once those troops should be broken, 
and furiously assailed, where any benefits previously con- 
ferred by mere discipline could be of such little use to pro- 
tect them. 

While the detachment from the left centre of the Irish army 
towards Aughrim was marching across to its right at Ur- 
rachree, the British took advantao^e of the movement to 
commence the passage of the bog, before that part of the 

' Mackay, ap. Dalrymple, vol. iii. p. 159 — 161, & Cont. Hist. p. 131, 
&c. I believe I am the first that has endeavoured to combine in one view 
the narrative of Dalrymple, from Mackay, with that of Story ; the English 
chaplain having overlooked the affair of the Prince of Hesse's division, 
authenticated by Mackay ; and the Scotch judge not venturing, or not 
knowing how, to reconcile the account given by his veteran countryman 
with that of the English chaplain. This I have done, (yet not without 
very great trouble,) by considering Mackay's and the Prince of Hesse's 
troops as composing part of the larger division of Ginckle's infantry, 
which Story describes as very strong, and as marching " over the bog 
below, where it was broader." And this theory of mine is at once re- 
concilable with the mention elsewhere, by Story, of Mackay's making 
an attack on the Irish "left," {Cont. Hist p. 129, 130 & 133,) and 
with whatever has been given from the General's MS, by Dalrymple. 



328 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Irish centre, where the way over has been described as 
being shortest, from the extension of the hedges into the 
morass. The troops appointed for this service, consisted 
of the 4 foot regiments of Colonels Erie, Herbert, Creigh- 
ton, and Brewer ; making a force that might vary from 
above 2,800 to somewhat more than 3,100 men.^ Colonel 
Erie, at the head of his own regiment, took the lead; the 
others followinof in such order as could be observed, where 
'' most of them," says the account, " were up to their 
middles in mud and water." 

When the British approached the first ditches at the foot 
of Kilcomedan, the Irish infantry fired upon them ; and, 
according to the plan of action agreed upon, to draw on, 
divide, and destroy the enemy in detail, the Irish then posted 
themselves in the next line of hedges, which were near to 
the first. The English, impetuously advancing to these 
also, met with a salute similar to the former ; and the Irish 
continued, in this manner, to fall back regularly — firing as 
they retreated by the communications from one close line 
of hedges to another, — till they succeeded in enticing up 
the aggressors nearly half a mile, or almost to the very spot 
where St. Ruth had his " main battle," marshalled to attack 
in his turn. Weakened and flushed, as the British regi- 
ments were, with making their way, under a continued roll 
of musketry, through such difficult and up-hill ground as 
they had traversed ; too far advanced to hope for any assist- 
ance from the rest of their foot, for whose passage across the 
bog they hadno^ waited ; seeing the Irish infantry, who had 
retired merely to ensnare them, now reassembling their 
whole force for a decisive effort, like a wave that has only 
receded to return with greater strength than before ; but above 
all, beholding the formidable Irish cavalry, who had hitherto 
held back, coming down upon both flanks by the passages 
which St. Ruth had caused to be made through the hedges and 
ditches for that purpose, — a general alarm took place. Co- 
lonel Erie, " as great an example of true courage and gene- 
rosity," says the English annalist, " as any man this day 
living," strove to animate his troops under these depressing 

' By the 1690, or old average of 705 men to each of William's foot 
regiments, 4 regiments would make 2,820 men : but by the 1691, or 
Dutch enumeration, already spoken of, which gives 780 men to each of 
the foot regiments, with the exception of the Danes, the 4 above-men- 
tioned regiments would make 3,120 men. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 329 

circumstances; advancing before them and crying out, 
*' There is no way to come off but to be braved But the 
example and encouragement of this gallant man were 
equally unavailing ; not an idea seems to have been enter- 
tained of any thing like a steady retreat by even an attempt 
to defend the lines of hedges in succession, as the Irish in- 
fantry had done ; so that, to use the words of the English 
chaplain, " they poured m great numbers both of horse and 
foot upon us ;" and " being both flanked and fronted, as 
also exposed to all the enemies shot from the adjacent 
ditches ; our men were forced to quit their ground, and be- 
take themselves to the bogg again, whither," he adds, '* they 
were followed, or rather drove down by main strength of 
horse and foot, and a great many killed." The brave Colo- 
nel Erie, after being twice taken and retaken, got off at 
length, though not without being wounded ; but Colonel 
Charles Herbert, Captains Gooking and Bingham, and 
'« several prisoners of distinction," remained in the hands 
of the Irish.* 

During this defeat of the 4 regiments of the English left- 
centre, the other larger division of their infantry, containing 
the regiments of Lord George Hamilton, Colonel St. John, 
Colonel Tiffin, Colonel Foulke, Brigadier Stewart, and 
" several other regiments,"^ were marching across the 
broader part of the bog below, which was nearer to Augh- 
rim than to Urrachree. This great body of foot was under 
the command of Major General Mackay, who, having pro- 

' Story, Cont. Hist. p. 12-930, Major Robert Tempest, and Letter to 
Narcissus Luttrel, Esq., ap. Rawdon Papers, p. 354 and 420 ; King 
James, vol. ii. p. 456 and 7. Colonel Charles Herbert is stated to have 
been subsequently killed, lest he should be released ; and the other pri- 
soners were finally recovered by their horse, after they had succeeded in 
getting round the bog. 

2 Cont Hist. p. 129 — 130. Mistaking, no doubt, other foreigners for 
" the French," Story places them here, or tov^ards the British right ; 
though, as there vvrere but 3 French regiments of foot in Ginckle's army, 
{Irish Secretary of War's Correspondence, No, MXL.,) I have shown 
this must be an error ; those 3 Huguenot infantry regiments having been 
in the other wing. {See before, p. 324 and 5.) The 5 regiments of Lord 
George Hamilton, &c., whose names alone Story specifies, would, at 
705 each, make 3,525, and, at 780 each, 3,900 men. But the division, 
or 2 divisions, to which they belonged, from the circumstance of Foulke's 
regiment, that " was always to guard the train," being called into action, 
{Cont. Hist, p. 126,) and, from other facts not necessary to detail, must 
have been of a far higher amount. 

28 



330 THE GREEN BOOK. 

ceeded with the advanced guard over the morass towards 
the Irish centre, ordered Brigadier Prince George of Hesse 
Darmstadt, with part of the troops, to take post in the corn- 
field, on the left of the outlet from the marsh there ; and 
not to assail the Irish infantry in the opposite hedges, till he 
should perceive him returning with the rest of the foot ; 
reaching the more difficult ground and ditches to the right ; 
and, above all, making such progress, as to be able to faci- 
litate an assault from the corn-field, on the one side, by 
flanking the Irish on the other. St. Ruth, on the contrary, 
intended, says the copyist of Mackay's account, " to attack 
the two bodies separately, before they could give succour to 
each other, being certain, if he defeated them, that their re- 
treat through the bog could not fail to be difficult." And 
the French General succeeded in his object of separately 
engaging with these 2 bodies of infantry, as completely as 
he had already done with the division of Colonel Erie. 
For, adds the same authority, '' the impetuosity of English 
valour, and of the Prince of Hesse's youth, caused the 
troops which Mackay had left in the corn-field to forget his 
orders. They pressed forward upon the enemy, before 
their General had yet surmounted the difficulties of the 
broken ground. The Irish w^aited for them till they came 
up, and the first fire was exchanged through the first line of 
hedges, so that the ends of the muskets almost touched. 
The Irish, who had made openings in the hedges, and also 
communications between these, behind, and to the right and 
left, retired to draw their enemies on. The English eagerly 
pursued : but, on advancing, they found that new bodies of 
horse and foot had taken new posts in new places, while 
some of their former enemies had reoccupied their former 
stations ; and that volleys of shot were poured upon their 
front, their flanks, and their rear. Ashamed of the dangers 
into which they had brought themselves by neglecting the 
orders of that General who had been so careful to save 
them, they struggled hard to make their ground good ; but 
at last gave way, returned to their station in the corn-field, 
— many of them even fled back through the bog, — and," 
concludes my authority, *' it was believed by all who saw 
the flight, that the English had lost the battle."^ 

Major General Mackay, being informed of this terrible 
scene of rout and slaughter, occasioned by the breach of his 
* Mackay, ap. Dalrymple, vol. iii. p. 160 & 161. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 331 

orders, returned to endeavour to assist Prince George's un- 
fortunate division. He likewise despatched an aid-du-camp 
in haste to Major General Talmash, to beg of that officer, 
instead of prosecuting his march and design against the 
Castle of Aughrim, to hurry back the left, with some fresh 
infantry, both to reinforce and rally the centre, and to give 
him the assistance he too found requisite, in order to be able 
to aid that body, as he originally proposed, by flanking the 
Irish, on the right, in their hedges.^ For, on the first ad- 
vance of the British troops to the hedges from the bog, *' the 
Irish," says Story, "laid so close in their ditches, that 
several were doubtful whether they had any men at that 
place or not : but they were convinced of it at last ; for no 
sooner were those soldiers, ^ and the rest, got within 20 
yards, or less, of the ditches, but the Irish fired most furi- 
ously upon them; which our men," he observes, ''as 
bravely sustained, and pressed forwards, tho' they could 
scarce see one another for smoak. And now," continues 
this English writer, " the thing seemed so doubtful for some 
time, that the by-standers would rather have given it on the 
Irish side ; for they had driven our foot in the centre so far 
back, that they were got almost in a line, with some of our 
great guns, planted near the bogg, which," he adds, " we 
had not the benefit of at that juncture, because of the mix- 
ture of our men and theirs."^ In the defeat of these troops, 
and those of Colonel Erie, the loss of the British, — exposed, 
drawn on, flanked, charged, pursued, and floundering in the 
mud of the morass, — must have been very great. Their 
own countryman, just cited, who was a witness of the ac- 
tion, incidentally describes the Irish, even at a period when 
the fortune of the day was beginning to turn against them, 
as knocking their routed enemies on the head, in the middle 
of a portion of the bog, nearly 200 yards beyond the lowest 
ditches.'* Yet Ginckle's soldiers fought with remarkable 

1 Compare Mackay, ap. Dalrymple, vol. iii. p. 160 & 161, Story, 
Cont. Hist. p. 130-132, and the plan of the field so often referred to. 

2 The words " those soldiers," are a necessary substitution in this ex- 
tract from Story for what he calls " the French," whom I have already 
shown, and will still further show, not to have been here, unless, like Sir 
Boyle Roche's bird, they could be " in two places at once." 

3 Cont. Hist. p. 130 & 131. This Uvely passage, subsequently 
strengthened by Irish testimony, even heightens the picture of defeat 
already given from the MS. of Mackay. 

4 Id. p. 132. 



332 THE GREEN BOOK. 

obstinacy ; for 3 times did they roll the tide of battle against 
the Irish, across the bog — though 3 times they were again 
driven back through the morass to the mouths of their can- 
non by the victorious Irish. ^ 

While such was the state of the contest in the centre be- 
fore Kilcomedan hill, on the side of Urrachree, where the 
batde was first begun by the Danish horse and the French 
infantry, and where the ground was most favourable to the 
attacking force, a warm engagement was maintained between 
that portion of the Irish right not kept out of action by the 
Danes, and the rest of the British left. This wing, com- 
posed altogether of foreign troops, was under the immediate 
direction of Ginckle himself, who, like the rest of his Gene- 
ral Officers, is stated to have exposed his person in the bat- 

' MacGeoghegan, tome in. p. 746. The Abbe's words are — " Tin 
fanterie ro3^ale fit des prodiges de valeur; elle poussa trois fois celle 
des ennemis jusqu' a leur canon !" And the cannon, alluded to, were 
those of the English centre, that were planted on their own side of the 
bog, as marked in the plan ; so that the conclusion respecting both 
parties is obvious. It is a popular belief, that, at this time, the unprin- 
cipled Balldearg O'Donnell — whom Story represents as 6 miles from 
Tuam, with a party of 1000 men in the neighbourhood, but to whom 
other, and, indeed, more exact accounts, would give a far larger force — 
was advanced with 8,000 men, but 8 miles from the field of battle, where, 
in fact, the enemy would appear to have apprehended his arrival, by 
stationing 2 regiments at Ballinasloe; the leaving at such an unimport- 
ant place, and at such an important period, a detachment as large as the 
garrison of Athlone, seeming otherwise inexplicable. According to an 
agreeable writer from those western districts of Connaught in which 
O'Donnell's troops were levied, " two hours would have brought his 
nimble infantry on the rear of Ginckle's army, then in disorder and con- 
fusion. The thunder of the cannon and the rolling volleys of musketry 
were audible in O'Donnell's quarters, and his soldiers eagerly demanded 
to be led to the assistance of their countrymen. But neither the roar of 
the artillery," it is added, " nor the ardour of his troops could induce 
the traitor to advance." {Dublin Penny Journal, June, 1833, />. 391 4" 
392.) It is then observed, that he afterwards deserted to Ginckle, as- 
sisted to besiege Sir Teague O'Regan in Sligo, and finally met in Wil- 
liam's service in Flanders " a fate too honourable for his deserts." If 
this belief, of O'Donnell's having been so near Aughrim with such a 
force, be true, Ireland, as well as Napoleon, would have her Grouchy, 
on whose coming up so much depended ! But, at all events, the troops 
of the Irish traitor, or a great portion of them, might have joined St. Ruth, 
in the interval from the fall of Athlone on the 30th of June, to the battle 
on the 12th of July ; and thus, in all probability, have contributed to 
gain a complete victory over Ginckle. Fortune has hitherto been sin- 
gularly favourable to the heart and arm ' 



THE GREEN BOOK. 333 

tie, as if he were but a common soldier.^ About 6 o'clock 
— when the attack between the 2 centres commenced — 
orders were also issued here for a general " onset" against 
the Irish line ; or, more accurately speaking, against that 
part of it, extending from the edge of the bog near the pass 
of Urrachree, to the hedged and entrenched ground occupied 
by the Irish foot, that were opposed to Melloniere's, Cam- 
bon's, and Belcassel's French infantry. This *' onset" is 
described by Captain Dunbar, a British officer, who was in 
the action, as having been " performed with a great deal of 
bravery," though " beateri back" by the Irish cavalry; so 
that, notwithstanding the peculiar difficulty and importance 
of the movement then making by the enemy's right towards 
Aughrim, we find him obliged to draw away to his beaten 
left a further detachment of cavalry, consisting of part of the 
2 finest regiments designed for the above-mentioned hazard- 
ous enterprise — or, the Marquis of Ruvigny's, formerly 
Duke Schomberg's French, and Sir John Lanier's English 
horse. ^ Till those troops came up — whose cross-march 
must have taken a considerable time, from the inconvenient 
distance for horse interposed by the broken and difficult 
ground between Aughrira and Urrachree, — no mention is 
made of any renewal of the unsuccessful "onset" of the 
enemy's horse on this point.^ 

By this repulse of their assailants, the Irish cavalry gained 
the important advantage of securing the defeat, to their left, 
of Colonel Erie's and the other divisions of British infantry 
in the centre ; which could not have occurred, had Ginckle's 
foreign horse been able to get round the Urrachree side of 

' Rawdon Papers, p. 358; Mackay, ap. Dalrymple, vol. iii. p. 162; 
Dutch Life of William in French, tome iii, p. 35 ; London Gazette, 
No. 2680. 

2 Compare Captain Bunbar, ap. Rawdon Papers, p. 349, with Story, 
Cont. Hist. p. 131, and the anonymous English life of William III., vol. 
II. p. 264. Ruvigny's and Lanier's horse regiments are enumerated in 
the Dutch muster-roll at 450 each, and are marked on the EngUsh right 
wing by Major Robert Tempest. 

3 The Dutch account, adverse as it is to the Irish, admits their "avan- 
tage sur I'aile gauche de I'armee Angloise," till its reinforcement " par 
quelques nouveaux detachemens ;" which detachments, known from 
Story to be no other than Ruvigny's and Lanier's horse, as they alone 
are stated to have been drawn from the English right to its left, did not 
reach the latter wing till after the passage of the EngUsh horse, on the 
right, by the Castle of Aughrim. Compare Captain Dunbar, as above 
referred to, with Cont. Hist. p. 131 & 133, and Capt, Parker, p. 35, 

28* 



334 THE GREEN BOOK. 

the bog, and thus rescue and aid their foot, in a general 
advance up the hill against the Irish. ^ During all those 
movements, or since the renewal of the battle at 5 o'clock, 
Melloniere's, Cambon's and Belcassel's foot had been en- 
gaged in a close and deadly struggle with the Irish infantry, 
posted against them, behind the hedges, entrenchments, and 
''high banks," says the Gazette, "that were one above 
another."^ In a Huguenot account of this part of the action, 
published in Holland, the Irish foot here are spoken of, as 
fighting with such fury, that their opponents were reduced 
to the most desperate condition. " Officers, soldiers," says 
the panegyrist of the Huguenot regiments, '* all signalized 
themselves in this encounter. But," he continues, " there 
remained only one course for them to adopt, — which was to 
perish, and to sell their lives dearly. "=* To this course, it 
is added, that the French refugees resigned themselves like 
brave men ; making, indeed, new efforts of resistance with 
a proportionate loss to their enemies, but, at the same time, 
finding themselves on the verge of a total rout, in spite of 
every imaginable exertion of courage on their part. And 
this representation, while it does justice to the heroism, 
conceals the actual extent of the reverses experienced by 
the French ; since, by another account, derived from one 
of the officers of those regiments, though misrepresented 
by hostile prejudice, we find, that, instead of having been 
able to dislodge the Irish from their posts, or to gain ground 
upon them, — the only object for which an attack was made, 
— the French, on the contrary, were completely repulsed, 
or merely struggling, through the aid of chevaux-de-frize, 
to keep their own ground against the Irish infantry, who, so 

^ See the plan. 

2 London Gazette, No. 2680. 

^ " Les regimens Francois que avoient ete les premiers de I'aile gauche 

qui avoient donne etoient aux prises avec quelques bataillons (Irlan- 

dois) qui s' etoient acharnez a eux, et qui se battoient en desesperez. 
La resistance de ces regimens (Francois) fut pourtant extraordinaire. 

Officiers, soldats, tout se signala dans cette rencontre. Mais ils ne 

leur restoit qu'un seul parti a prendre, qui etoit celui de perir, et de vendre 
cherement leur vie. Ce fut aussi le parti qu'ils prirent," &c. This writer 
speaks of the " bataillons Irlandois," that were " aux mains" with the 
French as "infiniment plus ybr^5 qu'eux;" and, in one sense, they were 
so. But, as regards the other, we have seen from King James, that his 
regiments were " very thin ;" we know the complements of Ginckle's 
regiments, and how amply they were recruited ; and, on ivhich side the 
superiority of numbers lay, I think I have abundantly estabUshed. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 335 

far from being, as at first, the defending, were thus become 
the attacking party ; making repeated assaults upon those 
artificial barriers thrown up by the enemy for their safety ; 
and even succeeding " once or twice" in becoming masters 
of those chevaux-de-frize} In a word, here, on their right, 
at Urrachree, as well as in their centre, on Kilcomedan hill, 
the Irish, says Captain Parker, who was at the battle, " main- 
tained their ground with great obstinacy and resolution, and 
repulsed our men in those places several times, with con- 
siderable loss. "2 The Irish infantry, in particular, whose 
general conduct is spoken of with the highest admiration, 
even by their adversaries themselves,^ — and who, on this 
wing, especially, are allowed to have maintained the longest 
advantage over their opponents, — are represented in the 
French narrative, founded on letters from Ireland, to have fol- 
lowed up their repeated and continued repulses of Ginckle's 
troops with remarkable vigour ; making, says that account, 
"a great massacre of the enemy's broken foot."'^ 

^ From the English author of the anonymous Life of William — who 
speaks of having "consulted several living eye-witnesses of many military 
actions," and, amongst others, M. Duteny, a Captain in one of the 
French regiments in the battle, and " a person of great integrity" — I 
subjoin the passage above adverted to, as a fair specimen of the English 
colouriiig which I am continually obliged to scour away, in order to get 
at truth. " While these things were doing on the right wing and centre," 
says this writer, who is transcribed by Harris, " those that first engaged 
towards the left did bravely maintain their ground ; and, though the Irish 
did once or twice make themselves masters of the chevaux-de-frize that 
covered the French foot, yet the French did courageously regain them !" 
This merely one-sided, unfair view of what I have demonstrated, from 
Huguenot evidence itself, that the French Captain, as "a person of great 
integrity," must have told this writer, is only one sample among thousands 
of what ^^Anglia (not Graecia) mendnx audet in historia.^^ {Anonymous 
LifCy Sec. vol. II. preface Sfp. 266, & London Gazette, No. 2680.) 

2 Memoirs, p. 35. 

2 The French sketch of the engagement (for it is no more) asserts 
that the Irish foot '' de 1' aveu meme des ennemis combattit avec un 
courage extreme ;" and truly makes this assertion, since the Dutch ac- 
count observes — " On leur rend ce temoignage qu 'ils se battirent en gens 
de coeur, et que leur infanterie sur tout fit des merveilles !" Even the 
London Gazette says — " The Irish were never known to fight with more 
resolution, especially their foot." Poor fellows ! 

^ " Les Irlandois,....ayant renverse leur infanterie, y firent un grand 
massacre!" And this statement, though made in reference to the action 
in general, must have been quite applicable here, where the Irish main- 
tained themselves longest; caused such distress, as I have already shown, 
to the enem}^ ; and were, in fact^ unconquered at all, but for events else- 



336 THE GREEN BOOK. 

St. Ruth, from the front of his camp at the top of Kil- 
comedan hill, beheld, with such feelings as may be easily- 
imagined, those severe and continued reverses of the enemy ; 
expressing himself in terms of high and peculiar satisfac- 
tion at the bravery of the Irish infantry. At first, only estimat- 
ing the character of the Irish soldiery by the shameless libel 
as to their ''cowardice in their own country," — for which 
there were no better grounds than the interested publica- 
tions of Anglo-Irish and Anglo-Dutch calumny abroad, and 
an almost utter want of the first implements of defence, 
against superior numbers, finances, experience, equipments, 
and artillery at home, — the French General had conceived 
a low, or erroneous impression of the courage of those troops. 
But, on appealing to the national heart, and touching the 
proper nerves of action as he had done, he found himself 
undeceived, and nobly undeceived, as all others will be, 
\v no doubt of the moral and physical devotion of Irishmen 
to the impulse of grand sympathies on grand occasions, — 
being, says King James, ''in a transport of joy to see the 
foot of which he had so mean an opinion behave themselves 
so well, and perform action worthy of a better fate!"^ 
Popular tradition, countenanced by the written testimony 
of MacGeoghegan, even represents the French commander 
as throwing up his hat into the air with exultation, on the 
third repulse of the hostile infantry to the muzzles of their 
cannon.^ Indeed, such was the utterly shattered condition 
in which the English foot were repulsed from all their great 
attacks on St. Ruth's position, that, in the words of the 
royal author, the Irish "looked upon the victory as in a 
manner certain ;"3 and the French General, on seeing the 
state to which the enemy's centre, in particular, was reduced, 
is mentioned to have turned round to those beside him, ex- 

where. On the authority of " les lettres d'Irlande," the French account 
even speaks of the English as " poursuivis durant plus de deux heures 
par les Irlandois!" — and, after all the heavy Enghsh j9or/er and Dutch 
gin with vi^hich I have been obliged to support myself, this little dram 
of French brandy and Irish whisky is not disagreeable. 

^ Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 457. 

" After the passage already cited, p. 332 n., respecting the third, re- 
pulse of Ginckle's foot to their cannon, the Abbe adds — " et on pretend 
qu'a la troisieme fois le General Saint-Ruth en fut si content, qu'il jetta 
dans I'air son chapeau pour exprimer sa joie !" And the enthusiastic 
exclamation, which St, Ruth is elsewhere recorded to have uttered, 
renders this not impossible in a lively Frenchman. 

3 King James, vol. ii. p. 456. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 337 

claiming, ''in a great ecstasy, I will now heat their army 
back to the gates of Dublin!''''^ 

Wherever, in fact, there was almost any cause for doubt 
or apprehension, St. Ruth's military dispositions had an- 
swered all his expectations. The troops marched from his 
left-centre to his right at Urrachree, where the English had 
most to hope for, had foiled them there. Their different 
assaults upon his centre, along Kilcomedan hill, were each 
a scene of defeat and slaughter. And now — with the single 
exception of a comparatively slight and easily remedied, 
though annoying lodgment, effected towards the left-centre 
or left of the army by some English infantry, through the 
mistake of one of his officers, of which an account shall 
presently be given, — the only thing requisite to effect a 
complete triumph for the Irish was a successful maintenance 
of the pass of Aughrim, the very easiest part of their whole 
task ; so much so, that an attempt upon it by the enemy's 
horse presented no prospect but that of their entire defeat, 
unless assisted by some of those strange casualties, or inter- 
ferences of Providence, which, though so improbable as not 
to be foreseen, have so often, in war, snatched victory from 
the conquerors, and transferred it to the vanquished. 

The right wing of the English, composed of their best 
regiments of cavalry and some battalions of infantry,^ gradu- 

' Story, Cont. Hist. p. 133. These words of St. Ruth, which the 
EngUsh chaplain gives in positive terms, and had ample means of hear- 
ing through the Irish officers who were taken prisoners, remind us of 
our youthful feelings, on reading, in Goldsmith's Greece, the words of 
Lysicles, the Athenian General, to his troops, upon their breaking the 
Macedonian foot, at Chaeronea. " Come on, my gallant countrymen ,• 
the victory is ours ; let us pursue these cowards, and drive them back 
to Macedon /" There were far better reasons, however, for St. Ruth's 
exclamation on Kilcomedan hill, than for the words ascribed to Lysicles 
at Chaeronea. 

2 From a view of the infantry regiments in the right and centre of 
Tempest's " line of battle," as compared with the general history of the 
action, it appears impossible to determine exactly what infantry fought 
in the right wing, except Gustavus Hamilton's and Kirk's, and the 3 
anonymous battalions of the London Gazette ; and it is also evident, as 
previously observed, though not verified by a note at the place, that the 
greater number of the British foot regiments were marched to, and en- 
gaged in, parts of the field, quite different from those where they were 
first stationed. The British cavalry, however, on this wing that ad- 
vanced against Aughrim, are found, from Tempest, to have consisted of 
3 dragoon and 7 horse regiments — with a deduction necessary to be 



338 THE GREEN BOOK. 

allly advanced towards Aughrim with their artillery, by the 
narrow way between the projections of the 2 bogs, already 
described. In the circular expansion of firm ground, before 
the outw^ard entrance of the last narrow passage leading on, 
over the rivulet, to the Castle and village of Aughrim, the 
enemy placed their cannon, and dislodged the Irish outguard 
at the mouth of that defile : the battery planted on the de- 
clivity of the hill by St. Ruth, to play over the bog, upon 
this circular spot, where the English made their final ar- 
rangements and fixed their cannon for the attack by their 
right, being probably prevented from interrupting such an 
advance, by the intermixture, in a portion of the bog towards 
the Irish left-centre, of part of the Irish foot with their beaten 
enemies ; so that, though losers, through such an intermix- 
ture elsewhere, in being deprived of the power of using their 
guns, the English appear to have been gainers by it here, 
from the Irish, in their turn, being equally unable to use 
their cannon.^ Nevertheless, on looking to the left, or into 
the fields beyond the skirt of the central morass and the 
small stream running across the road into the other bog on 
their right, the English hesitated in attempting to cross to 
the other side, seeing how strongly the Irish were posted 
there ; with their infantry, as usual, in the hedges, and their 
horse prepared, through the level passages made from be- 
hind, to charge to their aid. But when St. Ruth ordered 
the second line of his force, in that quarter, to march to Ur- 
rachree, '*it seems," says King James, " that he, who was 
to execute that order, caused a battallion of the first line to 
file off with the rest, supposeing the bog in front would pre- 
vent the enemies advanceing, but they," continues the King, 
*' who stood in awe of that battallion while it faced them, 
took courage when it was gon, and by the help of hurdles 
made a shift to get over the bog."^ 

Through this mistake — which, from the connexion of 
cavalry as well as infantry with the movement,^ I suppose 
to have been made hetvjeen Brigadier Henry Luttrell, who 

made for a part, probably half, of Ruvigny's and Lanier's horse, sent to 
Urrachree. ( Compare, before^ p. 320, Rawdon Papers, Gazette, ^c.) 
' See before, p. 297, 300, 301, 302, & 303, London Gazette, No. 
2680, and French and Dutch accounts. 

2 King James, vol. ir. p. 457. 

3 "Several bodies of horse and foot," says Story, Cont. Hist. p. 129. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 339 

was a Colonel of horse, ^ and some subordinate infantry 
officer in this transfer of troops, and to be the foundation of 
the national tradition about the " treachery of the General 
of the Irish horse that enabled the English to cross the 
bog" — three battalions of the enemy were enabled to slip 
over the skirt of the morass and the rivulet, into a corn-field 
on the Irish side, and establish themselves there till they 
could be assisted.^ This error, in the removal of the bat- 
talion, was productive of bad consequent3es ; the enemy, in 
their advance against the Irish infantry in the hedges here, 
meeting with but a feeble resistance, or one totally unlike 
the intrepid and successful opposition they had everywhere 
else experienced ; a circumstance only to be accounted for 
through the tradition of a general, and not unnatural im- 
pression, among the Irish troops in this quarter, that they 
were certainly betrayed, or the English would not have 
been able to cross the bog at all. The British, in fact, ap- 
pear from Captain Parker, who attacked in this direction, 
to have had to do with completely disheartened men ; the 
Irish foot, who had fought with such invincible heroism in 
every other part of the field, retiring or rather flying here 
from ditch to ditch, after giving '' only one scattering fire" 
from each, till they were driven to the rear of the Castle 
of Aughrim, or as far as the hollow plain, where their re- 
serve of cavalry was drawn up. Here, part of those brave 
horsemen, with the usual gallantry of the Irish cavalry, 
flew to the assistance of their infantry — coming down upon 
the English foot, and beating them again into the ditches f 
though the inaccessible nature of such ground for cavalry, 
and the hostile musketry directed against them from the 
hedges, necessarily checked the impetuosity of their first 
advance, by compelling them to fall back for some distance 
from the fire of an enemy, who was unable to stand before 
them, till placed beyond the reach of their charge. Mean- 
time, two more British infantry regiments, or those of Lord 
George Hamilton and Sir Henry Bellasis — one, if not both 
of which, belonged to Mackay's division opposite to the 
Irish left-centre,'^ and consequently would be to the right of 

' Compare before, note, p. 303, and Berwick's Memoirs, vol. i. p. 87, 
88, and 105. 

2 London Gazette, No. 2680. 

3 Parker's Memoirs, p. 34 & 35, and before, p. 299 & 300. 

''- See before, note 2, p. 329, and Major Tempest in Rawdon Papers, p. 



340 THE GREEN BOOK. 

the operations of the tliree battalions last mentioned — ap- 
pear to have been enabled, by these events, to come on 
through the broader portion of the bog towards the lined 
hedges on its margin there ;^ while the right wing of the 
British cavalry, taking advantage of the progress of the 
three battalions that had crossed through the blunder of the 
Irish officer, were "making what haste they could" to get 
round by the Castle of Aughrim, as well to succour those 
three battalions that were driven back into the hedges, as 
to assist all the rest of their foot, in the centre, that were 
beaten down into the bog. For this purpose, that wing of 
cavalry, accompanied by some field-pieces, approached 
through the last narrow road from whose entrance they had 
cannonaded the Irish outguard ; and were joined with Major 
General Kirk's and Colonel Gustavus Hamilton's regiments 
of infantry, who were to assail the hedges, entrenchments, 
old walls, and other works about the Castle, while the ca- 
valry were to endeavour to force their way through by the 
only passage for them, which lay, as has been already 
stated, within but 30 yards of the edifice, and was but a 
narrow, "boggy trench," over which, in the easiest part, 
but two horsemen could pass abreast, and that with much 
trouble.^ Strengthened, as the old Castle and its outposts 
were, with two pieces of cannon, two regiments of infantry, 
and one of dismounted dragoons, or about 1900 men, whose 
fire, if well-served, would completely command the only 
way for horse to advance beyond the building, St. Ruth 
naturally thought such a pass to be impregnable ; and, but 
for a ruinous accident, it would in fact, have been so.^ 

357, who represents the regiment of Bellasis as being in the British 
centre ; by which it would be included amongst those vaguely men- 
tioned by Story as " several other regiments." 

' Consult Tempest's Letter, Rawdon Papers, p. 353, in which there 
is an evident obscurity and misprint, through which, in connexion with 
the 3 battalions of the London Gazette, and the circumstance referred to 
in the last note, I have had great difficulty in clearing my way, accord- 
ing to my plan of not slurring over any difficulty. 

2 Text, and notes 1 & 2, of p. 300. " Boggy trench" is the ex- 
pression of Major Tempest, who was present, and who represents the 
passage for the English horse through it, as only affording room for 
them to proceed " one by one," and consequently, as even more difficult 
than what Story says. 

2 The 2 Irish regiments, at 13 companies of 60 men apiece, would 
be 780 each, and 1560 strong in all; and an Irish regiment of dragoons 



THE GREEN BOOK. 341 

Colonel Walter Burke, who was the officer intrusted with 
the guardianship of that important post, *' having sent to 
the camp," says MacGeoghegan, " for the ammunition 
which was necessary, four barrels of powder and as many 
of lead were forwarded to him ; but, instead of musket- 
bullets, he found only cannon-balls, that were of no use to 
him."^ The effect of such a disappointment, upon the 
opening of the barrels at the enemy's approach, would form 
the subject of a picture that need not be expatiated upon ; 
and the results of such a fatal occurrence were what might 
be expected. The van of the Enghsh horse pushed as 
quickly as possible along the narrow causeway, while, on 
their right. Kirk's and Hamilton's regiments made a diver- 
sion, by advancing towards the outworks of the Castle, 
after first turnpiking or barricading (with materials that 
should have been removed) the outlet of the " broad way" 
round from the rear of that building, by which a portion of 
the choice reserve of Irish horse there, " not doubting their 
success," says Major Tempest, were to sweep about by 
the plains to their left, and rush out upon the cannon, that 
were coming up the last defile towards Aughrim, with the 
rest of the English cavalry. 

Tradition, strengthened, as has been shown, by the nar- 
rative of MacGeoghegan, represents the Irish troops sta- 
tioned about the Castle, and the regiment of Colonel Walter 
Burke in particular, as attempting to supply the want of 
bullets, and maintain the pass, by pulling out some of the 
buttons of their uniforms, and discharo^inor those buttons 
and the ramrods of their guns against the enemy ; an effort 
of ingenious despair on the part of the Irish, v/hich, inade- 

contained 354 men; so that the whole would give 1914 soldiers. 
{Cont, Hist. p. 31, and before, note, p. 303.) Whether St. Ruth was 
wrong, in thinking that such a pass, so guarded, and properly furnished 
with ammunition, was impregnable to the British horse, I leave any 
military man to determine. Yet, at that able officer's judgment on this 
point, has the unjustifiable censure of EngUsh and Anglo-Irish scrib- 
blers been hitherto levelled. 

' Hist, tome in. p. 746. It is odd enough, that another Irish officer, 
Sir Charles MacCarthy, who was cut off by the Ashantees, January 
21st, 1824, should have been defeated by a similar sort of mistake — it 
being mentioned, in a letter from one of the surviving officers that 
appeared in some of the papers of the day, that the kegs, supposed to 
contain ammunition, were found to have macaroni instead of powder 
in them, 

29 



342 THE GREEN BOOK. 

quale and irregular as it was, especially as they were 
attacked at the same time from another quarter, yet appears 
from the English annalist, to have rendered the progress of 
the hostile cavalry through the causeway so difficult, that 
success would have been quite impossible, as St. Ruth 
thought, under a proper fire.^ To co-operate, as I have 
said, with this enterprise of their horse. Kirk's and Hamil- 
ton's regiments, after stopping the passage of the "broad 
way" made for the Irish cavalry, went together over a plain 
field, receiving such a fire as the Irish had to give ; and, 
having first effected a lodgment in a dry ditch near the 
castle, were necessarily able to take its outworks from troops, 
who, though without any means of returning a discharge of 
musketry, might, and no doubt would have endeavour'ed to 
defend those outposts with the bayonet, had the use of that 
weapon, at the end of a musket, been then known ; but 
who, being quite defenceless from the want of ammunition, 
against men well provided with it, immediately retreated on 
their approach, either into the Casde, or still farther to the 
rear.2 Meanwhile, the Irish horse from behind the Castle 
— who, in Major Tempest's opinion, might have over- 
thrown^ the English cavalry, had the way by which they 
were advancing been broader, and not protected by an iri- 

' Story, who, through Colonel Walter Burke, and several Irish offi- 
cers and soldiers taken in the Castle, inust have known why the 
Enghsh horse were enabled to pass it at all, has preferred to suppress 
any mention of the cause, and has then expatiated on the luonderful 
success of those horse in making their way through so many natural 
difficulties, added to what he calls "show'rs of bullets," where there 
were no bullets, unless bullet-buttons, if I may be allowed a pun. ( Cont. 
Hist. p. 131, 136, Sf 137.) And what was to be apprehended from 
such " show'rs of bullets" may be judged of by the following extract from 
Captain J. G. Steadman's " Narrative of a Five Years' Expedition 
against the Revolted Negroes of Surinam in Guiana^' vol iii. p. 106, 
107, & 114. After describing a severe action with the blacks, "in 
which," says he, " the firing was kept up like one continued peal of 
thunder for above 40 minutes," there was, he adds, not ''one instance of 
immediate death;" and, "notwithstanding the length of the contest, 
our loss by the enemy's fire was very inconsiderable ;" which " mystery," 
he continues, " was now explained, when the surgeons, dressing the 
wounded, extracted very few leaden bullets, but many pebbles, coat- 
buttons, and pieces of silver coin, which could do us little harm, by 
penetrating scarcely more than skin deep /" Such bullet-button and 
skin-deep details would not do for Story's impartial history. 

2 Major Tempest's Letter, ap. Rawdon Papers, p. 353 & 354, & 
Storv, Cont. Hist. p. 131. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 343 

tervening ditch, — made a semi-circular movement to their 
left, towards the place where the rear of the hostile cavalry- 
were stationed at their artillery. But, finding the impossi- 
bility, from what had happened, of now being able to cap- 
ture the British cannon, this fine body of Irish cavalry took 
their way back, in order to be useful elsewhere, by facing 
about again to the rear of the Castle, and coming down the 
plains to their right.^ By this time, a part of the right wing 
of the British horse, — " doing more than men,"' says Story, 
" in pressing and tumbling over a very dangerous place," — 
effected their passage, through the narrow causeway, or 
"boggy trench," to the firm ground beyond the old Castle. 
Sir Francis Compton, of Lord Oxford's regiment, with as 
many of his troops as could manage to engage first, fell " at 
random" upon the Irish. The English, however, were 
''once or twice" driven back; till, being aided by some 
of Major General Ruvigny's, Colonel Langston's, and Colo- 
nel Byerley's horse, and Brigadier Levison's dragoons, they 
succeeded in making good their footing, '' tho' not," ob- 
serves their annalist, " without the loss of several, both 
men and horses."^ 

Previous to this last movement on the British right,^ St. 
Ruth, having been informed of the confusion caused by tnP 
mistake in withdrawing the front battalion towards his left, 
was approaching on horseback, to remedy every thing by 
his presence on this side, — where alone any thing had to be 
remedied. He was accompanied by the whole of that body 
of horse which was nearest to his person ; leaving behind 
him, in the rear of his centre, as a reserve, " the greatest and 
best part" of the Irish cavalry, under his Lieutenant Gene- 
ral, the brave Sarsfield, Lord Lucan, "with positive direc- 
tions," says Captain Parker, " not to stir from thence, until 
he received his orders."^ Perceiving, in his advance, the 

^ Tempest's Letter, passim. 

2 Story, Cont. Hist. p. 131 & 132. 

3 That is, about the time when the 3 English battalions first slipped 
over the bog, which, from a comparison of Parker's account with that 
of the Gazette and Story, was befo7'e the advance of Sir Francis Comp- 
ton with his horse beyond the narrow causeway. 

^ Memoirs, p. 34-35, and King James, vol. ii. p. 457. This valu- 
able passage from Parker, and another that shall be afterwards quoted, 
show, that the King's expression of " all the cavalerie," as regards the 
force which St. Ruth brought with him, and which Mackay (ut sup. p. 
299,7?. 1) designates as "a strong body of troops," is only to be un- 



344 THE GREEN BOOK. 

right wing of the British horse, scrambling, in some places, 
'' one by one," and, in others, but two abreast, through the 
causeway by the Castle of Aughrim,and not being aware of 
the want of bullets on the side of the Irish, which alone 
made such an attempt at all feasible,* he is reported to have 
asked, '^ What do they mean hy it ?''' To which, being 
answered, "They are certainly endeavouring to pass 
there, and attack you on the left,''' — he is stated to have 
rejoined, in the full confidence of success, — '''They are 
brave fellows, ifs a pity they should be so exposed T'^ 
And this confidence was quite natural, — repulsed and broken 
again and again as the enemy's infantry had been by 
the Irish right and centre, — driven back as they were into 
the ditches, even on this wing, by the Irish cavalry, before 

derstood, in the sense of all the French General's life-guard ; and not of 
all the cavalry upon the Irish centre. Story, too, in speaking of St. 
Ruth, as merely ordering "a brigade of his own horse," or, in other 
words, but a portion and not all of them " to march up," virtually con- 
firms Parker's statement as to a reserve of Irish cavalry being still in 
hand ; and the whole, taken in connexion, completely set at rest the 
adverse comments upon this battle by the Duke of Berwick, {Mem. vol, 
I. jO. 100,) who was not in Ireland, either then or ever after, and whose 
♦marks are evidently based on the testimony of some enemies of St. 
Ruth, of whom, partly from his being a Frenchman, and partly from his 
bad temper, we know there were numbers. Indeed, in no other way 
can the Duke's observations be accounted for; since they are as much 
contradicted by the result of the information furnished to his royal father, 
King James, as by those minute details of the action, which I have 
given, in the very words of the enemy's officers themselves. On other 
points, however, or as regards any thing that he himself saw, or could 
inform himself upon in Ireland, the Duke's authority is unexceptionable. 

* Compare note 3, on p. 343. 

2 The battle of Aughrim bears a considerable analogy to that of 
Waterloo, in the similarly opposite temperament of the Generals on 
each side ; in both actions being fought upon a Sunday ; in each being, 
at one period, in favour of the army inferior in number, or of the Irish in 
one case, and the French in the other ; in the popular belief of treason 
having occasioned the loss of both ; in the circumstance of both termi- 
nating a war — the one in Ireland by the capitulation of Limerick, the 
other on the Continent by the surrender of Paris ; and the exclamation 
of St. Ruth concerning the Enghsh horse, on this occasion, is not unlike 
Napoleon's reported observation to his aides-de-camp respecting the 
Scots Greys, — ''How steadily those troops take their ground ! Observe 
those grey horse ! Are they not noble troops P Yet in half an hour 
I shall cut them to pieces /" But Napoleon had not the cavalry of 
which he spoke in such a trap as St. Ruth had those horse opposed to 
him. Story is my authority for the words attributed to the latter. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 345 

whom neither horse nor foot had hitherto been able to stand, 
— struggling through, or, in a few instances, hardly emerg- 
ing from, the "boggy trench," as Ginckle's right of horse, 
and last hope, now were, — and, in short, with no one ad- 
vantage on the enemy's side, but the possession of one or 
two fields, some hedges, and the outworks of the old Castle, 
which had been obtained merely by a mischance, and which, 
on the overthrow of the cavalry, that were only enabled to 
pass the Castle by another mischance, could be easily re- 
gained from Kirk's and Hamilton's regiments, and the three 
battalions in the hedges, with whom, observes the English 
chaplain, in reference to their right of horse, " indeed, all 
was in hazard, by reason of the difficulty of the pass/'^ 

The French General continued to advance towards that 
struggling wing of the British, at the head of his brigade of 
horse, and, riding up to one of his batteries, ordered the 
gunner to point his fire in a particular direction against the 
English. 2 He then pushed on to ''the place," says Story, 
" where he saw us indeavovr to come over,"^ and he reached 
that spot of ground, opposite to the emerging enemy, 
which was on the slope of Kilcomedan hill, under the Irish 
camp. A better situation could hardly be imagined for the 
charge of his brigade of cavalry,* which, besides its strength 
in point of numbers, *' being extream good," observe the 
royal Memoirs, '' would soon have dispersed those few 
squadrons of the enemie."^ The Irish, in addition to the 
power of making a fine down-hill dash upon their oppo- 
nents, were, in fact, quite fresh, were all collected, regularly 
formed, and under the eye of their General-in-chief. The 
British, that had gotten out of the "boggy trench," were 
but 4 squadrons ; were not recovered from the struggles 
they had been forced to make, in order to gain the limited 
and precarious footing they had acquired at the bottom of 

^ Cont. Hist. p. 131. 

2 In various histories of the battle of Waterloo, Napoleon, likewise, is 
related to have gone and shown one of his gunners how to fire ; and he 
himself mentions, that it was by an order of his, to give a discharge from 
a cannon at the advancing English cavalry, just before the close of the 
battle, that the Marquis of Anglesey's leg was swept off. Moreau and 
St. Priest, he adds, were served still worse by a similar process, at Dres- 
den and Rheims, in being killed, as they deserved to be, when carrying 
arms against their own country. 

3 Cont. Hist. p. 133. ^ Personal information. 
^ King James, vol. it. p. 457 and 8. 

29* 



346 THE GREEN BOOK. 

the- declivity, and the edge of the defile ; were "yet but a 
forrneing," says King James ;^ and, in a word, had not at 
their head, in the person of Sir Francis Compton, though a 
brave man, an officer of such high rank and corresponding 
influence, as St. Ruth. The French General, fully ap- 
preciating the great advantage of his situation, and exulting 
in the contemplation of a certain victory before him, placed 
himself at the head of his guard, to give the word to charge, 
observing, says King James, " to those about him. They 
are beaten, let us beat them to the purpose T^^ But his days 
were numbered. The charge that would have given him 
a Marshars staff, and the sceptre of Ireland to the house of 
Stuart, was not to take place. Just as he spoke those re- 
markable words, so expressive of his conviction that the 
successes of the past v/ere on the point of being completed 
by the triumph of the future, a ball from one of the English 
field-pieces blew oft' his head,^ and in that head alone was 
the plan of action on which the destiny of Ireland de- 
pended. 

" He was killed, after having given all the proofs of a 
great courage and a great capacity," says an eminent French 
military historian of the day.* And this eulogium of St. 
Ruth by his own countryman is justified by the commen- 
dations even of his adversaries themselves. The English 
chaplain, who mentions, in terms of censure, his alleged, 

^ King James, vol. ii. p. 457 and 8. Compare before, p. 346 and 
n. 4. 

2 King James, vol. it. p. 457 and 8. I need not dwell upon the ample 
means which King James possessed of being correctly informed of this 
last emphatic remark of St. Ruth, which is given as the result of accu- 
rate information on the subject, and agrees with the purport of what Pere 
d'Orleans, the Jesuit, likewise says upon the authority of the King, and 
of " M. Sheridan, Irlandois, autrefois Secretaire d'Etat, Conseiller du 
Conseil Prive, et Commissaire General des Finances dans son pais ;" of 
whom, adds the French writer, '•' je n'ai tire de personne de meilleurs et 
de plus surs Memoires." The Jesuit — who should, however, have made 
a far better and fuller use of such excellent sources of information — 
states that the Prince of Orange would have lost Ireland, if, in the battle 
which was given to Ginckle by St. Ruth, "ce Francois, Chef de I'ar- 
mee royale, n'eut ete tue d'un coup de canon apres avoir deja rompu 
toute I'infanterie ennemie, et donnant actuellement un ordre pour suivre 
le mouvement de sa victoire, que sa mort arreta, etdonnaasonennemi." 
{Hist, des Revolutions d^ Angleterre^ tome iii. p, 455.) 

s Rawdon Papers, p. 358, London Gazette, Story, &c. 

^ M. de St. Ruth y fut tue...apres avoir donne toutes les marques d'un 
grand courage, et d'une grande capacite." 



THE GREEN BOOK. 347 

though, no doubt, exaggerated severities against the Protest- 
ants of France, speaks in terms of praise of his '* dexterity 
in choosing such a piece of ground" for a position, '* as 
nature itself could not furnish him with a better;" adverts, 
with equal approbation, to the many sagacious improvements 
of that position by his military skill ; and adds, " we must 
allow him to be very brave in his person, and indeed con- 
siderable in his conduct."^ And, to cite the more valuable 
military authority of Captain Parker, who was engaged 
against that wing of the Irish army on which the French 
General was slain, — '« had it not been that St. Riith fell, it 
were hard to say how matters would have ended ; for, to do 
him justice, notwithstanding his oversight at Athlone, he 
was certainly a gallant, brave man, and a good officer, as 
appeared by the disposition he made of his army this day." 
His " centre and right wing still maintained their ground ;" 
and, " had he lived to order Sarsfield down to sustain his 
left wing, it zvoidd,^^ concludes the Captain, '' have given 
affairs a turn on that side ;"^ — or, in other words, have 
given the victory to the Irish, even independent of that 
charge upon Sir Francis Compton's '' few squadrons," 
which, if made, 7nust have been successful.^ 

The corpse of the unfortunate general, over which his 
cloak was thrown by one of his attendants, was conveyed 
to the rear, beyond Kilcomedan hill. There, it is said to 
have been stripped of its dress and accoutrements, which 
are represented, by tradition, to have been suitable in mag- 
nificence to the ostentatious taste of his age and country, 
the dignity of his rank, and the splendour of his military 
station. What finally became of his body could never be 
ascertained. By some, it was affirmed to have been flung 

» Cont. Hist. p. 122 & 134. 

2 Memoirs, p. 35 & 36. 

3 " Cette mort (St. Ruth's) causa la perte de Tavantage qui etoit cer- 
tain," says the French account; and with what justice has been seen. 
The effect of such a sudden fall as that of St. Ruth in arresting the pro- 
gress of victory, even in an army greatly superior in number, and ac- 
customed to success, is sufficiently displayed in the case of the death, at 
Mantinea, of Epaminondas, whose Theban and Thessalian cavalry had 
beaten that of his opponents ; whose infantry was routing theirs ; and 
whose army, unlike St. Ruth's, was not 15,000 opposed to 26 or 27,000, 
but 33,000 Thebans and their allies, against only 23,000 Lacedaemo- 
nians and their confederates. (See Diodorus Siculi^j torn, ii.p. 69-72, 
edit. Wesseling,) 



348 THE GREEN BOOK. 

into an adjoining bog; by others, it was reported to have 
been left where it was stripped, among the rest of the 
slain, — ^ 

" A headless carcass, and a nameless thing." 2 

The sudden fall of the French general, at such a critical 
period, '' caused a great confusion," says King James, 

^ Cont. Hist. p. 133 & 134. The traditions to which I have adverted 
in my text were communicated to me — with the exception of that in the 
next note, and the circumstance in reference to St. Ruth's dress con- 
nected with it — by a gentleman who, many years ago, when he was a 
boy, made several inquiries into the subject, amongst old people, on the 
spot. 

2 Jacet ingens littore truncus, 

Avulsumque humeris caput, & sine nomine corpus. 

j^neid it. 557 & 558. 
A thorn-bush still marks the place where the French commander fell ; 
and the toast, among a certain party, of " The memoy^y of the gunner 
that shot St. Ruth,''^ which was common till within the recollection of 
persons yet alive, and the preservation, at Athlone, of the field-piece by 
which he is said to have been killed, tend to show, along with other cir- 
cumstances, what importance that party attached to his death, and that 
it may have happened, as the Irish think, by something more than a 
mere chance shot. At least, among the Williamite or Orange faction in 
the North, there is still a tradition to this effect. The day before the 
battle of Aughrim, a party of the Irish army took away and ate some 
sheep of a gentleman, named O'Kelly, that were feeding there. O'Kelly 
and his herdsman went to the Irish camp to seek redress, and were 
brought before the Lieutenant General St. Ruth. After hearing the 
complaint, St. Ruth told O'Kelly, that, on such an occasion, it was very 
odd that any Irishman should grudge a few sheep to feed his country- 
men, who were on the eve of fighting the last great battle for Ireland, 
and for his (O'Kelly's estate) included, which, with all that was on it, 
and perhaps its owner's life into the bargain, would be forfeited, if the 
English conquered ; and that, under such circumstances, the Irish sol- 
diers were surely well entitled to what they had taken. O'Kelly, how- 
ever, who was a niggardly fellow, still persisting in his remonstrance, St. 
Ruth threatened him with death if he would not desist. Upon this, 
O'Kelly turning to his herdsman, desired him, in Irish, to mark the 
General. The herdsman intimated that he would ; saying, at the same 
time, in Irish also, " Master, you're robbed ; but ask the Frenchman at 
least for the skins." The soldiers, wanting these to sleep on, especially 
as rain fell on that day, and St. Ruth being very naturally vexed at 
such a mean and impertinent request, he told O'Kelly to begone imme- 
diately, and that he ought to be hanged. O'Kelly did so, proceeding 
towards the English camp, to obtain as much revenge as he could, and 
deUvered himself and his herdsman to a party of Portland's horse, to be 
brought before Ginckle. Having listened to all they said, Ginckle sent 
for an experienced artillery officer named Trench ; telling him how useful 



THE GREEN BOOK. 349 

" tho endeavours were made to conceal his death. "^ The 
first squadron of the life-guard halted. The rest did so too. 
A " great delay'' took place. ^ All orders ceased when most 

those Irishmen might be, and to take them along with him, and, in cer- 
tain circumstances, to fire as they could direct him. Trench brought 
with him some of his best gunners, and accompanied the English right, 
on the Aughrim side, where the entrance to the defile would have to be 
cleared by artillery. Having contrived, while the main force were push- 
ing on, to drive a piece of light ordnance a considerable distance over the 
bog, by means of shifting planks, the English party and their Irish 
friends remained there for some time, lying on their faces, when the 
herdsman, who had remarkably good sight, suddenly cried out in Irish, 
"Master, master, I see the Frenchman !" O'Kelly, having interpreted 
this to Trench, the latter asked, " Where 1" To which the herdsman, 
pointing to the place, answered, " See him there, grandly dressed like a 
bandman, in front of those horse !" — St. Ruth being at that time actually 
placing himself at the head of his guards, on the declivity of Kilcomedan 
hill. Trench and his assistant, an intelligent sergeant, then levelled the 
gun, which, being remarked to be still too low, on account of a slight 
sinking of one of the wheels in the bog, Trench, it is added, pulled off 
one of his boots to remedy the defect; which, being found to do so, the 
piece was discharged — the whole party throwing themselves down in 
such a way as to avoid the recoil of the gun, and the effects of a reply 
from the Irish. On the smoke blowing away. Trench cried to the herd, 
"Is the Frenchman hit?" "He's on his horse still," replied the herd; 
" you've only blown off his hat ; but then," he quickly added, " the head 
and hat are both off, for I see them both rolling down the hill !" — which 
was right, continues the story, for the headless body immediately after 
fell, or was taken off the horse. Trench's family, concludes the anec- 
dote, were in time ennobled through this exploit ; O'Kelly did not forfeit 
his land in the neighbourhood, but had it augmented by an additional 
grant ; and the herdsman obtained a similar reward for his patriotism, 
which his descendants enjoyed as shoneen gentry. This northern ver- 
sion of the matter, — strangely enough countenanced by history in various 
matters of detail connected with it, — I give as it was told to me. A 
common impression yet in Connaught is, that St. Ruth was pointed out 
by one who had been his servant to the English gunner. It may not 
be uninteresting to mention, that the Rev. Alexander Franklin of St. 
Mark's Church, in this city, informed me, that, shortly after the French 
Revolution, when the officers of the Brigade left France, in consequence 
of the fall of the royal family, he met with a great-grandson of St. Ruth, 
among the officers of the regiment of Fitzjames, who held their mess 
near Christ Church. To say that an evening amongst such men was 
delightful would be superfluous. Young St. Ruth, who was then not 
above 20 years old, was tall, thin, possessed of a sharp-featured, intelli- 
gent countenance, and fair-haired, and fair-complexioned. The con- 
nexion of his family with Ireland, through the Brigade, appears to have 
been kept up. 

' Memoirs, p. 458. 2 j^, ib^ 



350 THE GREEN BOOK. 

wanted. Some of the guards went off with those who had 
accompanied the general's remains. Numbers more of 
another body of Irish horse — most probably those who 
came round by the castle, after being disappointed in their 
intended attack on the English cannon, — drew off likewise. 
The report of their commander's death spread from man to 
man. A general retrograde movement of the cavalry com- 
menced. They, however, were partially recovered from 
their confusion.^ But the enemy's horse, — whose superior 
numbers could only have been beaten, by attacking them 
when divided, or before they could all get beyond the nar- 
row, ''boggy trench," — had, in the mean time, passed 
through, in consequence of the " great delay" which had 
taken place. ^ Major General Mackay — who had devolved 
on Major General Talmash the duty of rallying the English 
centre, and who now acted in Talmash's former post on 
their right, ^ — pushed forward with a considerable division 
of the British cavalry; and, profiting by the distraction and 
disarray of the Irish on this side, drove the Duke of Tyr- 
connel's regiment of horse before him, with one part of the 
force under his command ; while another, consisting of a 
portion of the Marquis of Ruvigny's Frenc ' regiment, was 
similarly enabled to dislodge a regiment of Irish dragoons 
from an advantageous position.^ 

Depressed by the fall of the heroic Doctor Stafford, who 
was slain about the same time as St. Ruth, and whose death 
is mentioned to have been productive of equally disastrous 
effects upon the minds of the soldiery,^ — deprived of the 

! Story, Cont. Hist. p. 133—134. Parker's Memoirs, p. 35. Dal- 
rymple, vol. iii. p. 1 62. 

2 King James, vol. ii. p. 458, &c. 

^ Compare Mackay, ap. Dalrymple, vol. iii. p. 160, and Story, Cont 
Hist. p. 129, 132, & 133. I have corrected an inaccuracy of Dalrym- 
ple, (p. 161) by himself and Story. 

^ Anonymous Life of William III. vol. ii. p. 264 — plagiarized by 
Harris. 

^ Duhigg's History of the King's Inns, p. 239. The learned Mr. 
Duhigg, the Librarian of the King's Inns, from whom I take my account 
of this accomplished and noble-minded ecclesiastic, only lived in the last 
generation. But, as a barrister, and a scholar of equally extensive and 
profound reading, he was capable of knowing the truth, and, as a Pro- 
testant, he had no motive, especially at the time he wrote, to praise too 
highly the conduct of a Roman Catholic clergyman, in the position of 
Stafford. Events, too, since Doctor Stafford's time, have shown Mr. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 351 

aid of numbers of their own horse, — taken in flank by that 
of the enemy, — and likewise closely assailed by the rally- 
ing and reinforced English infantry of the same wing, — the 
2 lines of the Irish foot were broken/ This progress of 
Sir Francis Compton and Mackay, on the right, facilitated 
the efforts of Talmash to remedy the frightful disorder of 
the British centre, and make another attempt upon that of 
the Irish. Hastening up, with some fresh troops, to where 
the beaten English regiments were getting '' knockt on the 
head,"^ in the middle of the bog, about 200 yards from the 
last ditches at the foot of the hill, Talmash re-formed and 
strengthened the broken regiments ; and, availing himself 
of what was elsewhere taking place, drove back the Irish to 
those ditches, with a loss stated at 300 men. The results 
of these successive movements of the enemy's right and 
centre quickly extended to his left at Urrachree, w^here 
everything had hitherto been so favourable to the Irish. The 
detachments from Ruvigny's and Lanier's horse, sent for to 
Aughrim to aid Ginckle's foreign cavalry in their unsuc- 
cessful endeavour to force their way round the edge of the 
bog on this side, arrived in the favourable time presented by 
the effects of Mackay 's advance on the right, and Talmash's 
in the centre.^ Then Ginckle ordered Ruvigny to place 
himself at the head of the detachment from his own French 
regiment — one of the most distinguished, on this and other 
occasions, in William's army — the other detachment from 
Sir John Lanier's regiment, the Queen's regiment of Horse 
Guards, and the Earl of Portland's, or William's own regi- 
ment of Horse Guards,^ making not less than 12 or 1300 

Duhigg's picture, of the consequences of such an event as this at 
Aughrim, not to be overdrawn. 

' King James, vol. ii. p. 458, and inferences deducible from previ- 
ously-mentioned facts. 

2 Cont. Hist. p. 132. 

3 See before, p. 332, 33, 34 & 35, and Cont. Hist. p. 131, 132 & 133. 
^ Cont. Hist., Anonymous English Life of William, and Dutch Life 

in French, tit sup. 

Story^s " part," or say half, of Ruvigny's and Lanier's regiments, 

according to Dutch list, 450 

Portland's, or King's Guards, knocking off 80 for losses at the 

beginning of the day, 400 

Queen's Guards, not distinguishable by that name in Dutch list, 

but probably the same as the King's, 480 

1330 
The *' cowards at home" were rather troublesome after all! 



352 THE GREEN BOOK. 

chosen cavalry, who succeeded in charging round the bog, 
after encountering an opposition from the Irish, which is 
represented as having required the most extraordinary efforts 
to overcome. And, notwithstanding the great confusion, 
the want of suitable and uniform directions, and the general 
influx and junction of the enemy's superior numbers thus 
occasioned by St. Ruth's fall, and the ignorance, as well of 
his plans, as of his fate, in which Sarsfield was left, the 
contest was yet kept up, — '' the horse and foot of our right 
and their left mixing," says Story, so that ** there was no- 
thing," he observes, '*but a continued fire, and a very hot 
dispute all along the line ; the Irish," he adds, "indeavour- 
ing to defend their ditches, and our men as forward to beat 
them from thence."^ But this did not, and could not, last 
much longer. The Castle of Aughrim, indeed, on the left, 
notwithstanding its ''old and ruinous" state, its never hav- 
ing been "a place of any strength, only as seated on a 
pass," its outworks being taken by Kirk's and Hamilton's 
regiments, and its garrison being without bullets, was still 
gallantly held by Colonel Walter Burke, and the troops who 
retired into it.^ But, masked as it was by the 2 hostile 
regiments, and passed as it was by the entire of the English 
right, its importance had ceased — though the keeping of it 
would have been of such consequence to change the face of 
affairs on this side, had St. Ruth, by the success of his in- 
tended cavalry charge, been enabled to relieve it with a 
reinforcement and proper ammunition. Mackay, on the 
right, with his horse and foot — but particularly the former 
— now co-operating with Talmash's infantry in the centre, 
and both connecting their operations with Ruvigny's cavalry 
on the left, quickly pushed up the hill. The Irish, unable, 
from their disordered and disunited state, to contend against 
the 3 hostile bodies, acting under so many advantages, were 
driven from one ditch to another towards their camp at the 
top of Kilcomedan,^ where Sarsfield, to the rear of the centre, 
had been so particularly enjoined by St. Ruth, to remain in 
reserve with the largest and finest portion of the horse, till 
a contrary command should be sent to him. Obliged to be 
the more punctual in obeying that order, on account of their 
unreconciled quarrel, and the ignorance in which he was 

» Cont Hist. p. 133. 

2 Id. p. 136. 

3 Dalrymple, vol. in. p. 162, and Cont. Hist. p. 132—134. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 353 

left of measures, that made it incumbent on him to consider 
himself bound to act towards the Frenchman, rather as a 
subordinate than a leading officer in the engagement, that 
brave Irish commander was still at his post ; omitting 
"several opportunities," says Captain Parker, ''of doing 
great service ;"^ and wondering, no doubt, at the state in 
which he was suffered to remain amidst such wide and 
rapidly-increasing confusion ; but not being aware, in time, 
of the death, that would have enabled him to act on his own 
account. "At length he saw all was lost," observes Parker, 
and was consequently compelled to join the crowd, "with- 
out striking one stroke," continues the Captain, "though 
he had the greatest and best part of their cavalry wiih him."^ 
The British followed the Irish to their camp at the top of 
Kilcomedan, which having levelled, and thereby deprived 
the latter of any barrier against their shot, no further stand 
was attempted ; the infantry hastening towards the large 
red bog that had flanked their left, and the cavalry taking 
the high road to Loughrea.^ 

These events, on the centre and right, occurred in good 
time for the preservation of the French infantry, that were 
stationed between the Danes upon Ginckle's extreme left, 
and the pass for cavalry , through which Ruvigny's division 
of horse had charged round the edge of the morass against 
the Irish right-centre. After the repeated repulses from the 
hedges, entrenchments, and "high banks," in consequence 
of which the Huguenot infantry could only save themselves, 
even on their own ground, by a barrier of chevcmx-cle-frize, 
their historian describes them, as being several times on the 
point of being overpowered and cut to pieces by the Irish, 
in spite of their bravery. A regiment of 700 Danish Guards 
first rescued the French from destruction, by taking the as- 
sailing Irish in flank, and thus compelling them to give back. 
But, in spite of this new assistance, the Irish recovered them- 
selves, renewed their attack with the same fury and success 
as before, and again reduced the French to such extremities, 

^ Memoirs, p. 36. 

2 Id, ib. King James, after mentioning the breaking of "both the 
lines of the Irish foot," adds, " the hors not advanceing in time to their 
assistance ; but insteed of that, giveing all for lost, thought of nothing 
but saveing themselves and so gaue an entire victory to the English." 
Parker accounts satisfactorily for this, by showing why the horse did not 
advance. 

3 Cent. Hist. p. 134. 

30 



354 THE GREEN BOOK. 

that Major General La Forest, seeing the imminent hazard 
to which his countrymen were exposed, made the greatest 
exertions to come to their aid, with a still further reinforce- 
ment. This second arrival of troops began to give a turn 
to the contest in favour of the French, of which La Forest 
availed himself, to collect and form the 3 regiments, along 
with his own soldiers, into one strong body. They then 
charged the Irish with such impetuosity, that the foremost 
of their battalions, wearied after making so many long and 
gallant exertions, were broken, and even driven in such con- 
fusion upon the other battalions who were to support them, 
that they also were thrown into disorder, by the rapidity 
and violence of the shock. And now, being entirely exposed 
on their left by the defeat of the whole of their army towards 
Kilcomedan, and all farther hopes of making an effectual 
resistance being completely at an end, the Irish only thought 
of savino^ themselves. From the necessary exhaustion of 
the French regiments, the various intricacies of a great 
part of the ground, the well-known aptitude of the Irish for 
making their way through such a country, the circumstance 
of Ginckle's Danish horse on his utmost left being still held 
in check, and the purport of what we read in the Huguenot 
narrative, it would appear that many effected their escape, 
though, adds that account, " they could not flee so well but 
that a very great number were left upon the spot, either 
killed or disabled." 1 

^ " D'abord ils prirent la fuite, mais ils ne purent si Men fuir qu'il n'en 
restat un tres grand nombre sur la place, ou hors de combat." {Huguenot 
Account.) All the particulars of this contest among the "high banks,'^ 
&c. on the English left, which Ginckle himself represents as " a very 
warm dispute for above 2 hours," and one, which, from another statement 
of his as to time, could not have been terminated till after his right and 
centre had succeeded, are slurred over by Story as an affair of " not 
much action for near 2 hours," — he not having a knowledge of French, 
(as we see by his book,) to collect information from the French them- 
selves as to what occurred among them, and having even mistaken, as I 
have shown, their real position in the battle, by making them to have 
been in Ginckle's right-centre, instead of in the centre of his left. Story, 
also, has the same fraudulent colouring that I have previously exposed, 
respecting this portion of the English left having "kept their ground." 
The Huguenot narrative is only wrong, in the supposition that La Forest, 
on the English hft, was successful with the French infantry before Ru- 
vigny with his horse had conquered in the centre,- the first progress of 
the English having been on their right, opposite Aughrim, where St. 
Ruth fell, and where Sir Francis Compton with the van, and Mackay 



THE GREEN BOOK. 355 

And now, no part of the Irish army kept the field but 
those detachments of horse and foot that were ranged along 
the rivulet or " little brook," on the remotest part of their 
own right, opposite Ginckle's Danish cavalry and infantry. 
The Danes did not disturb the Irish, till the effect of 
Mackay's success through the pass of Aughrim became 
visible, in the general advance of the British. Then, to 
prevent the Irish troops that faced them from attempting to 
give any assistance elsewhere, the Danes attacked them. 
Yet, though now dispirited by the forlorn condition of all 
the rest of their army, the Irish here did not yield without 
a brave struggle ; but gave the enemy a warm opposition 
for ''about half an hour," — when, ''being pressed on all 
sides," says Story, they broke and fled. The infantry suf- 
fered severely by Ginckle's foreign cavalry, particularly the 
Danish horse, who are characterized as " excellent pur- 
suers ;" though both these and the other horse of the enemy 
seem to have preferred slaughtering the scattered foot that 
could offer no resistance, rather than making too close an 
attempt at obtaining satisfaction from the retreating Irish 
cavalry, for the rough handling they had given them during 
the preceding part of the day. " Most" of the Irish horse, 
here as well as elsewhere, are, in fact, admitted to have 
effected their retreat to Loughrea, though several miles from 
the scene of action ; and though, by the previous defeat and 
pursuit of the Irish centre, many of Ginckle's cavalry must 
have got before the horse of this wing on the road, and must 
consequently have been either obliged to make way for, or 
been broken through by, those Irish horse, who could not 
otherwise have gained the "advantageous pass" near that 
town, where the English assert that they would have inter- 
cepted and destroyed them, only for the approach of night, 
and the fall of a thick misty rain.^ These occurrences, 
with the vicinity of a bog and other circumstances, " saved 
the lives," says the English annalist, " of many thousands 
of their foot." For, " though the obstinacy of the combat 

with the rest, of the English horse, succeeded in forcing a passage; 
secondly, on the centre, — where Talmash next to Mackay, and Ruvigny 
next to Talmash, advanced ; and thirdly, on the left — where, by what 
^fld' occurred. La Forest ^rs^, and then "the Danish horse and foot," 
were enabled to complete the victory. {Huguenot Narrative, London 
Gazette, Story, Sfc. ut sup,) 

' Compare Cont. Hist. p. 134-135, and the plan. 



356 THE GREEN BOOK. 

had been such," observes the Dutch account, " that more 
than half the officers of the Irish army were killed or made 
prisoners, and almost all the General Officers were either 
taken or slain, "^ the few brave survivors are related to have 
in some degree facilitated the retreat of their men ;^ and one 
remarkable instance of address and presence of mind con- 
tributed to the escape of numbers. The chaplain of an Irish 
regiment, called O'Reilly — probably Father Edmund, who 
came from France with King James, and who, from his 
family name and the post he held, must have belonged 
either to Colonel Edmund Bui O'Reilly's regiment of foot 
or dragoons^ — "ordered a drum-major," says MacGeoghe- 
gan, " to beat a charge on a little eminence near the bog, 
through which King James's troops were to pass." The 
alarm and consequent delay among the pursuers occasioned 
by this well-timed command, added to the difficulties of the 
adjacent bog, the foggy rain, and the approach of night, 
enabled the remains of the army to retire, partly towards 
Galway, and partly towards Limerick. "^ 

The English, " after things went clear on their side," 
completed their victory by the capture of the old Castle of 
Aughrim, in which, under such circumstances, they boast of 
putting " a great many to the sword;" only sparing Colonel 
Walter Burke, (the commander,) his Major, 1 1 other officers, 
and 40 soldiers. And this was an instance of peculiar 
clemency compared with the remainder of their conduct; 
little more than 450 prisoners being made, inclusive of 
officers f so that the wounded, of which we have seen there 
were numbers, were inhumanly massacred. Amongst the 
rest, according to the unimpeachable testimony of Doctor 
Lesley, a body of above 2000 Irish soldiers, who threw 
down their arms and asked for quarter, were all killed on 
the spot ; and 2 of the Irish officers, or Lord Galway and 
Colonel Charles Moore, are instanced by the same author, as 

^ " II suffit pour juger de I'opiniatrite du combat, de savoir que plus de 
la moitie des Officiers de I'armee Irlandoise furent tuez ou faits prison- 
niers ; et que presque tous les Officiers Generaux y ont perdu, ou la 
liberte, ou la vie." 

2 Berwick, Memoirs, tome i. p. 101. Even his informant allows, that 
" les Officiers Generaux" were able " faciliter un peu la retraite." (Com- 
pare before, p. 343, n» 4.) 

^ See before, p. 263 note. 

^ MacGeoghegan, tome iii. p. 747, and Berwick, tome i. p. 101. 

5 Cont. Hist. p. 136, 137. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 357 

having been perfidiously slain, " after quarter" was actually 
given, and " the battle over."^ 

To palliate such shameless inhumanity, a libel equally 
shameless — like that afterwards concocted to justify similar 
atrocities against the brave Highlanders at Culloden — was 
subsequently given out, to the effect, that the Irish army 
had been specially charged, if they conquered, to give no 
quarter.^ And this unfounded charge, to render it more 
acceptable to the gross guUability of British bigotry, was 
principally attributed to the Irish priests, at whom every 
blow is first aimed, that is destined to pass through the 
vitals of their country. But the propagation of such a false- 
hood was the only excuse for the perpetration of such a 
scene of cruelty as that of which the inventors of the false- 
hood were themselves guilty. The character of the liar 
has been connected with that of the murderer from a very 
early period. 

All the Irish tents, baggage, military stores, provisions, 
great quantities of their arms, and their artillery, consist- 
ing, as has been said, of but 9 pieces, w^ere captured, to- 
gether ^vith 32 colours and 1 1 standards. Dismissing the 
Williamite exaggerations of the loss of the vanquished at 7 
or 8,000,^ it may be fixed, on the authority of King James, 
v/ho had the best means for ascertaining the truth, at " near 
4,000 men."^ Of these, the enemy state the Irish officers 
of every rank taken at 111, and those killed at between 5 
and 600, — including several of the highest distinction ; a 
number, which would show, that, having risked every thing 
on this fatal day, the majority of those brave men did not 
care to survive it.^ Omitting the incredible diminution of 

' Lesley's answer to King, p. 162-163, Hib. Dom. p. 144. 

- For this ''weak invention of the enemy," compare Cont. Hist. p. 
123, and the anonymous English Life of William IIL vol. ii. p. 261 ; 
and for the similar defence of English cruelty against the gallant and 
humane Highlanders, and its complete refutation by Prince Charles 
Edward^s officers, Lords Balmerino and Kilmarnock, before their execu- 
tion, see Sir Walter Scott's Tales of a Grandfather, vol. iii. p. 258, 259 
& 313--3d series. 

• Cont, Hist. p. 136, and Dutch account. 

■' Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 458. 

^^ Cont. Hist. p. 137 & 138. George Peyton, Esq. High Sheriff of 
the County Westmeath, writes as follows to Ginckle, respecting an in- 
terview with some of the Irish officers taken prisoners in Bally more, 
about a month before the battle. " The officers, being quartered in the 

30* 



358 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Ginckle's loss, in the Dutch account, to but 378 soldiers 
killed, and to less than 800 wounded; and the manifestly 
improbable details of the same in Story's English returns, 
at but 600 of the former and 906 of the latter ;^ we may 
place more confidence in the private or less suspicious esti- 
mate of that loss by their own officer, Captain Parker, who 

room next to me, I sent severally for two Captains of my acquaintance. 

They say it is our fault we have so many enemies ; and that 

they are sensible of their unhappiness in depending upon the French ;" 
but " that they must, and will, and are preparing to fight it out soon ;" 
and "that they have orders to have none but fighting men !" {Copy 
Letter, June lOtk, 1691, penes me.) That the Irish soldiery were in- 
spired with similar feelings to their officers is not less wittily than 
mournfully illustrated by the traditional anecdote, told by Mr. O'Con- 
nell, of the reply made to one of his ancestors, Colonel O'Connell, on 
his asking a soldier in his regiment, the morning of the action, — lohy 
he appeared in the ranks, without being shaved, upon such a day (Sun- 
day) and on such an occasion ] "^rm/z, Curnil,'^ said the poor fellow, 
" the man that has the head to-xight may shave it /" an answer, 
whose merit, as a ready-witted combination of point and pathos, has, 
perhaps, never been surpassed. I subjoin, from various sources, the 
following names of the principal officers of King James's army killed 
and taken : — 

Killed — The Commander-in-chief, Lieutenant General St. Ruth; 
Lord Kilmallock, (Sarsfield;) Lord Galway, (Burke;) Brigadier Wil- 
liam Mansfield Barker ; Brigadier H. M. J. O'Neill ; Brigadier Con- 
nell ; Colonel Charles Moore ; Colonels David and Ulick Burke ; 
Colonel Cuconacht or Constantine Maguire ; Colonel James Talbot; 
Colonel Arthur ; Colonel Mahony ; Colonel Walter Nugent ; Colonel 
Felix O'Neill ; Lieutenant Colonel Morgan ; Major Purcell ; Major 
O'Donnell ; Sir John Everard, &c. 

Taken — Lord Duleek, (Bellew;) Lord Slane, (Fleming;) Lord 
Bophin, (Burke;) Lord Kenmare, (Browne;) Major General Dorring- 
ton ; Major General John Hamilton, (who died of his wounds, and was 
brother to the gallant Lieutenant General Richard Hamilton, captured 
at the Boyne, and to the brave and accomplished Colonel Anthony 
Hamilton, who fought against the Enniskilleners, and wrote the well- 
known Memoirs of Grammont, &c. ;) Brigadier Tuite ; Colonel Walter 
Burke; Colonel Gordon O'Neill; Colonel Butler of Kilkash ; Colonel 
O^Connell; Colonel Edmund Madden; Lieutenant Colonel John 
Chappell ; Lieutenant Colonel John Butler; Lieutenant Colonel Bag- 
got; Lieutenant Colonel John Border; Lieutenant Colonel Macgennis; 
Tiieutenant Colonel Rossiter; Lieutenant Colonel Macguire; Major 
Patrick Lawless; Major Kelly ; Major Grace ; Major William Burke; 
Major Edmund Butler; Major Edmund Broghill, (most probably an 
English error for the Irish name, Braughall ;) Major John Hewson, 
&c. 

^ Dutch account, and Cont. Hist, p, 139-140. 



THE GREEN BOOK, 



359 



says. " we had above 3,000 killed and wounded;'" an as- 
sertion equally countenanced by reason, or all the circum- 
stances of the battle, and by King James, who, after giving 
the amount of what his own army suffered, adds, " nor was 
that of the English much inferior."^ The enemy,— eor- 
cluding any below Ensigns or Cornets from among their 
own officers, though including Corporals, &c., among 
those of the Irish, — acknowledge to have 73 officers killed, 
and 111 wounded; among the former of whom were 1 
Major General, 3 Colonels, 1 Lieutenant Colonel, 4 Majors, 
19 Captains, 24 Lieutenants, and 22 Ensigns or Cornets.^ 
As the English document from which these particulars are 
given is represented to have been drawn up only two days 
after the battle, we do not know how many of Ginckle's 
officers and soldiers subsequently died of their wounds ; 
though a French contemporary writer of eminence says, 
with every appearance of probability, that many of them 
did so. In fine, all circumstances considered, or allowing 
for the amount of men and artillery engaged on both sides, 
and the time the action lasted, which was about 4 hours, it 
will be found, on comparing the killed and wounded officers 
in Ginckle's above-mentioned return, with those of the 
same rank in the Duke of Wellington's published lists, that 
the number of English officers slain or disabled at Aughrim 
was not only far greater in proportion than the amount of 
those at the battles of Talavera, Salamanca, and Vittoria, 
but even much higher than what was suffered at Waterloo, 
where the British loss (including that of the Hanoverians) 
was so much heavier than in any of the other engage- 
ments. 

^ Memoirs, p. 36. 

2 Memoirs, p. 458. 

3 Cont. Hist. p. 139. In the names of Ginckle's wounded officers, 
we find the Prince of Hesse Darmstadt, Lord George Hamilton, Lord 
Cutts, Colonel Erie, Lieutenant Colonel Brudenell, &c. 

■* " Dont plusieurs moururent," are the words of the French military 
historian respecting Ginckle's wounded ; and see, in order to calculate 
the authentic proportion of the British loss of officers at Aughrim to 
that at Talavera, Salamanca, Vittoria, and Waterloo, the materials fur- 
nished, under the proper heads, by Gurwood's Wellington Despatches, 
Napier's Peninsular War, & Gourgaud's Campaign of 1815. As re- 
gards an analysis of the period, specified as that during which the engage- 
ment between the English and Irish armies continued, I may here ob- 
serve, that, exclusive of skirmishing, which, from the French account, 
would appear to have begun *'sur le midi," the battle must have lasted 



360 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Such was the battle of Aughrim, or Kilconnel, as it was 
called by the French, from the old Abbey to the left of the 
Irish position; ^ a battle, unsuccessful indeed on the side of 
the Irish, but aChseronea, or a Waterloo, fought with hero- 
ism, and lost without dishonour. "Looking amongst the 
dead three days after," says Story, " when all our own, and 
some of theirs were buried, I reckoned in some small in- 
closures 150, in others 120, &c. lying most of them by the 
ditches where they were shot !" ^ Over such men, there was, 
and there could be, no superiority, but the success of chance, 
and the triumph of barbarity.^ Their remains were nearly 
all left exposed on the ground where they so nobly fell — a 
prey, says my authority, "to the birds of .the air, and the 
beasts of the field." Yet, even among these, we find an 
instance of an affecting nature, which it is pleasing to con- 
trast with the merciless ferocity exercised by the human 
brute against the brave defenders of their country. "There 
is," observes the English chaplain, " a true and remarkable 
story of a grey-hound^ belonging to an Irish officer: the 
gentleman was killed and stript in the battle, whose body 
the dog remained by night and day ; and tho' he fed upon 
other corps with the rest of the dogs, yet he would not allow 
them or any thing else to touch that of his master. When 
all the corps were consumed, the other dogs departed, but 
this used to go in the night to the adjacent villages for food, 

about 4 hours — the horse-combat commencing at, and going on from, 
2 to 3 o'clock — the contest being renewed by the 3 Huguenot regiments, 
on the EngUsh left, at 5 — the combat being general at 6 — and it being 
after 8 before Ginckle was victorious. (Story, Gazette, Sfc. ut sup.) 

^ French writers, London Gazette, and Dutch accounts, &c. 

2 Cont. Hist. p. 137. 

^ " It ?niist in justice be confessed," says William's Orange biographer, 
Harris, from contemporary official sources, which I, also, have perused 
— " it ?nust in justice be confessed, that the Irish fought this sharp battle 
with great resolution ; which demonstrates, that the many defeats before 
this time sustained by them cannot be imputed to a national cowardice, 
with which some without reason impeached them, but to a defect in mili- 
tary discipline, and the use of arms, or to a want of skill and experience 
in their commanders. And now% had not St. Ruth been taken off, it 
would have been hard to say wdiat the consequence of this day would 
have been." This admission is every thing from an Irish Williamite. 

* Mr. Otway very properly calls this dog a " wolf-hound," or as we 
say, " an Irish wolt-dog ;" the breed of which, though now almost ex- 
tinct, was numerous in Ireland in Story's time, and famiUarly known by 
the name of *' grey-hound," though that appellation conveys quite a dif- 
ferent idea at present. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 361 

and presently to return again to the place where his master's 
bones were only then left: and thus he continued," from 
July, when the batde was fought, '' till January following, 
when one of Colonel Foulks's soldiers being quartered nigh 
hand, and going that way by chance, the dog, fearing he 
came to disturb his master's bones, flew upon the soldier: 
who, being surprized at the suddenness of the thing, unslung 
his piece, then upon his back, and killed the poor dog.'^ 
He expired, with the same fidelity to the remains of his 
unfortunate master, as that master had shown devotion to 
the cause of his unhappy country. And, in o^/ier countries, 
such devotion and fidelity would have been adorned and im- 
mortalized in the brightest colouring of sentiment and genius.^ 
But, in Ireland, all virtue was doomed 

To fall beneath the arm of evil power, 

And perish hopeless — 
to be crushed in Hfe — and remain "cold and unhonoured" 
in death. Yet " other men and other \\mes ivill arise," — 
perhaps even now have arisen — " to do justice toils memory;" 
for, in the history of nations, there are few spectacles more 
entitled to the admiration of the noble mind, and the sym- 
pathy of the generous and feeling heart, than the fate of the 
gallant men, and the faithful dog of Aughrim. 



CHAPTER VHI. 

Complete confutation of the notion of the Irish having "fought badly 
at home," by a full expose of what an immense sum it took to put 
them down. Capabilities of heland for national or self-legislative in- 
dependence, as contrasted with the native strength of Greece in the 
time of Philip and Alexander, Spain under Philip II., Holland from 
the time it threw off the Spanish yoke to the French revolution, Por- 
tugal before and after it cast off the same yoke, and Prussia down to 
the French Revolution. Concluding induction from the whole of the 
preceding facts, that Ireland is entitled to, would be able to attain, and 
can only expect justice from, a Repeal of the Union. 

The limits of this essay — already extended far beyond 
what was originally contemplated— compel me to close any 

' Cont. Hist. p. 147. 

2 I need scarcely advert to the Odyssey and the dog of Ulysses, and 
to the beautiful poem on " the dog of the nameless brave," during the 
3 days of July, by Casimir Delavigne— of which a spirited English ver- 



362 THE GREEN BOOK. 

observations on this w^r for the present with the following 
facts, from which the statements of those Anglo-Dutch and 
Anglo-Irish authorities, by whom Voltaire was led to men- 
tion the Irish as ''fighting badly at home," will appear in a 
light more discreditable, perhaps, than the assertions of any 
set of scribblers that have ever contributed to mislead an 
historian's judgment, with the misrepresentations of na- 
tional prejudice, factious rancour, and sectarian intolerance. 
The population of Ireland at the Revolution was not, at 
the outside, more than 1,500,000 persons. The Catholic, 
or genuinely Irish portion of these, who did not consider 
themselves as mere settlers in, but as natives of, the country, 
were not, at the most, above 1,000,000. The remaining 
500,000 were Protestants, the great majority of whom owed 
their obnoxious possessions to conduct so contrary to all 
justice, that they were as hostile to Ireland as they were 
devoted to England, to whom they were alone indebted for 
existing as a privileged caste of bigoted and domineering 
planters, at the expense of the rights of others. The re- 
venue of Ireland, about this period, when in its most flourish- 
ing state, or from 1682 to 1685, before the war in the country 
that reduced it to the lowest pitch, was only £266,209 a 
year. The war with this litde Irish or Catholic population, 
of no more than 1,000,000 of persons of all descriptions, 
cost England and her Anglo-Irish planters 3 campaigns. 
In these the expenditure for her regular forces alone — in 
1689 above 25,000, in 1690 above 41,000, and in 1691 
above 37,000 men, — was as follows, according to her own 
official writer, so often quoted: — 

I. — "The army that landed with Dake Schomberg, 

and that came some time after into Ireland, with 

those of the Derry and Inniskillin troops, received 

into pay under his Grace's command in the year 

1689, being 9 regiments and 2 troops of horse, 4 

regiments of dragoons, and 30 regiments of foot ;'* 

their whole pay for that year would come to £869,410 7 6 

li. — "His Majesty's (William's) royal army in that 

kingdom, in the year 1690, consisting of 2 troops 

of GcATiBs, 23 regiments of horse, 5 regiments 

of dragoons, and 46 regiments of foot," their pay, 

considering the difference between the numbers 

sion is to be found in the Reliques of Father Prout. But how could 
Moore have passed by such an incident for an Irish poet as that in the 
text] 



THE GREEN BOOK. 363 

in the British and foreign regiments, would 

amount to £1,287,630 2 

III. — " The army in that kingdom in the year 1691, 
commanded by Lieutenant-General Ginckle, be- 
ing 20 regiments of norse, 5 of dragoons, and 42 
regiments of foot," their pay for that year came to £1,161,830 12 10 

IV. — " Then the General Officers' pay, the train, 
bread, wagons, transport ships, and other contin- 
gencies, make at least as much more, which is. . £6,637,742 5 

Total expense of English regular forces in Ireland 
for 1689, 1690 and 1691, by Story's foregoing 
statements £9,956,613 7 4 

English national debt (funded and unfunded) in 

Dec. 1697, after the peace of Rvswick, £21,515,742 13 8^ 

Deduct national debt in March, 1689, £ 1,054,925 

Total expense of war in Ireland and on the Con- 
tinent, £20,460,817 13 SJ 

Deduct on account of Ireland, £ 9,956,613 7 4 

English war on the Continent, £10,504,204 6 4^ 

English war in Ireland, £ 9,956,613 7 4 

Yet, to the immense sum of s69,956,613, 7s. 4d., as 
being only the expense of the British regular forces in Ire- 
land, must be added, out of the seemingly-greater cost of the 
war on the Continent, a sum that would make the Irish 
war, in reality, the more expensive of the two; the deduc- 
tion, adverted to, being necessary on the score of arms, &c., 
supplied to the Irish Williamite faction, which furnished as 
militia or yeomanry, according to Story, " at least 25,000 
men."^ So that, without saying any thing of what the 
Williamite chaplain entitles, ''the farther destruction of the 
Protestant interest, by cutting down improvements, burning 
houses, destroying of sheep and cattle, taking away of 
horses," &c., the cost of this 3 years' war to England against 
but 1,000,000 of Irish, would be nearer to i^l 1,000,000 
than £10,000,000 — or an expenditure not only far above 
that of the contest against Louis XIV., but much greater than 
that to which perhaps any population, so small, and so 
miserably assisted as the Irish were by France, ever yet 

^ This assertion respecting the full amount of the Irish Williamite 
militia is given in the concluding page (328) of Story's work, and tends 
to justify my previous observations on the subject, {page 216 <V note,) 
though made in ignorance of such an assertion ; the last 3 pages of the 
only copy of Story then in ray possession having been torn out. 



364 THE GREEN BOOK. 

put any hostile nation, so vastly superior in organization, 
numbers, wealth, and alliances, as England then was. I 
may add that, even supposing the Irish revenue of ^266,209 
a year not to have been so much reduced as it was, by the 
estimated number of 100,000 young and old destroyed, and 
300,000 '' ruined and undone" in the course of the struggle, 
England was put to above 40 years' purchase for that reve- 
nue ; or some millions more than the whole annual rental 
of her own territory was then worth ; its amount being cal- 
culated on the very first authority, or that of Sir William 
Petty, not to have been, at that time, above £8,000,000 a 
year.^ Now if, under almost every disadvantage, this one 
million, not between eight and nine millions, of Irish, cost 
William's government such an enormous quantity of time, 
trouble, bloodshed, and expense to overcome them ; and if 
that resistance which they gave to his immensely-superior 
power be called, ''fighting hadly at home," pray when did 
any nation ever fight well at home ? — and can we wonder, 
that, though the Irish "loere worsted," as Story observes, 
"yet their officers would confidently affirm, That their 
77ien had as much courage as those that heat themT^ They 
had, at the very least! And, in spite of the long injustice 
done to their memory by the prejudice of a foreign, and the 
bigotry of a domestic usurpation, that country for which 
they suffered and bled would deserve to be enslaved indeed, 
if it did not deeply feel, in pride for their gallantry, though 
in sorrow for their defeat, — 

Forget not the fields where thei/ perish'd — 
The truest, the last of the brave ! 

But what such a country as Ireland may be made for or 
AGAINST England, according to the justice or injustice Avith 
which she may be treated — according to the real union that 
may succeed, or the mock Union that must eventually fail 
between the 2 islands, — can be most clearly conceived by 
comparing the following historical circumstances with the 
great natural powers of a strong, fertile, and finely-situated 
insular territory, of 32,201 square miles; capable of sup- 

^ See, for all those facts, Introduction to the ParUamentary Census 
Report for 1821— Story, Cont. Hist. p. 316, 317, 318, 328, and preface 
— King's State of the Protestants of Ireland, appendix, p. 51 — M'Cul- 
loch's edition of Smith's Wealth of Nations, vol. it. p. 25 & 26 — Hume, 
from the Parliamentary Journals, March, 1689 — and Sir Wm. Petty, 
ap. Newenham's View of Ireland, p. 244. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 365 

plying its people with all the necessaries of life ; having a 
military population of 2,000,000 ; an annual revenue of at 
least ^5,000,000 ;^ and, notwithstanding all the disadvan- 
tages of such external and internal misrule as it has endured 
for centuries, being, even at present, as T have before shown, 
surpassed among the Christian monarchies of Europe by- 
only 6 powers, or France, Britain, Austria, Russia, Prussia, 
and Spain. ^ 

The sum total of the forces which Greece, with the single 
exception of Lacedaemon, was capable of furnishing to 
Philip of Macedon, for his intended Persian invasion, about 
146 years after Greece, or, more properly speaking, only a 
portion of Greece, had utterly discomfited Xerxes, backed 
by all the disposable forces and the immense wealth of half 
a continent, was but 215,000 men.^ 

According to an enumeration made by the Roman govern- 
ment, of the amount of men fit to bear arms which Rome 
and Italy could furnish against the threatened invasion of 
the Gauls, between the first and second Punic war, the 
fighting population of Rome and Italy were but 770,000 in 
number.'* 

The African territory of Carthage — or that which was 
the basis of the mighty power whose fleets traversed and 
commanded the seas from Guinea to the British Isles, and 
which, after acquiring the dominion of Corsica, Sardinia, 
and the greater portion of Sicily, besides the whole of the 
Spanish Peninsula, disputed the empire of the world with 
Rome for so many years — '' hardly equalled that of the 
modern kingdom of Portugal."^ 



• The annual revenue publicly credited to Ireland since the Union, 
does not average more than £4,000,000 a year ; but that it is, in reaUty, 
far above £5,000,000, Mr. Staunton of the Register has shown over and 
over again. 

2 See before, p. 158, &c. 

3 Justin, lib. ix. cap. v. If Lacedaemonia could raise so large a force 
in Philip's time as she had at the battle of Platea, when, according to 
Herodotus, the Spartans supplied an army of 40,000 men, the 215,000 
men of Justin would be increased to 255,000. But Sparta, in Philip's 
days, and long before, appears to have been incapable of making such 
another military effort. By the w^ay, Philip's own kingdom, Macedon, 
when at its greatest height, or under his son, had, according to Strabo, 
but o:yE million of inhabitants ! 

^ Polybius, lib. ii. cap. 2. 

^ Foreign Quarterly Review, No. xxvii. p. 220. 

31 



366 THE GREEN BOOK. 

• 

In the reign of Philip IL — when the Spanish empire in- 
ckided Belgium and Holland, (till tyranny compelled the 
latter to revolt,) the Milanese, Naples and Sicily, Sardinia, 
all the valuable portion, at that time, of the West Indies, 
and finally, when, by the conquest of Portugal, it included 
several extensive and valuable kingdoms and dependencies 
in Africa, the whole of South America, and possessions in 
Asia, extending from Ormuz, in the Persian Gulf, to China 
and the Moluccas — in that reign, Spain had but eight mil- 
lions of inhabitants."* 

Holland — a collection of swamps, merely rescued from 
the sea by dykes, inhabited by a set of poor herring-fishers, 
and, according to Mr. Butler Bryan, not larger nor more 
populous than the single province of Ulster,^ — threw off 
the yoke of Philip II. of Spain, when she could not have 
had a population of two millions ; and these not protected 
by an insular, but exposed by their continental, position. 
Yet, though known amongst the haughty Spaniards by the 
contemptuous appellation of '' the beg gar men,'''' the Dutch 
freed themselves from the sway of Philip II. whose armies 
marched, under the famous Duke of Parma, to Paris ; w^hose 
fleets, the greatest ever till then beheld, menaced the na- 
tional existence of England ; whose power threatened the 
liberties of Europe, whose immense territories were such 
as I have already described, and whose " annual revenue,' 
according to Voltaire, " was about thirty millions of ducats, 
without being obliged to lay any new taxes upon his people," 
or a '' yearly sum more than all the Princes of Europe 
had TOGETHER !" and whom, according to the same author, 
"the expending of three thousand millions of livres" in 
wars alone, and when money was so much more scarce and 
valuable than it is at present, " did not impoverish."^ Sub- 
sequently, or during 2 centuries of the highest pitch of 

^ Voltaire's Universal History, chap, cxxxvii., vol. iii. p. 288 — Nu- 
gent's translation. Yet other authorities make the population of Spain 
far less. 

2 Practical View of Ireland, p. 73. 

3 Voltaire's Univ. Hist. chap, cxxxviii, vol. iii. p. 283. The Dutch, 
in this noble contest of apparently hopeless vv^eakness and poverty against 
the immensely superior numerical strength, territorial dominion, and 
financial resources of Spain, renewed all the glories of ancient Greece in 
her struggle against the " great king." {Heeren^s Political History of 
Ancient Greece, chap. Yiii.p. 126 and 7.) There is no work so much 
wanting in English Uterature as a really good history of Holland. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 367 

commercial opulence and naval and military glory, as the 
humbler of Spain, the conqueror of a great part of the 
Indies, the unsubdued opponent, on both sea and land, of 
England, under Charles II and France under Louis XIV., 
and lastly, as the giver of a sovereign or deliverer to Eng- 
land herself under William III. — subsequently, or during 
the highest period of this splendid political career, the re- 
venues of Holland, says an able writer, never exceeded 
^3,000,000 per annum, and its population was little more 
than TWO millions and an half! Even as late as the French 
Revolution, the entire land force of the Dutch republic was 
rated at but 44,000 men, of whom only 30,000 were avail- 
able for actual service.^ 

England, in the reign of Elizabeth, or when, in addition 
to her other successes nearer home, she triumphed so sig- 
nally over the power of Spain by sea and land, and, more 
especially, over the so-called '* invincible" Armada — had, 
according to Hume, a revenue ''much short of £500,000 
a year,^^^ — compare it with Phillip II. 's as given above — 
and. according to Voltaire, a population not much above 
FOUR mill ion s.^ 

Portugal, that mere side''S'bone of Spain — that, never- 
theless, gained such deserved glory as the tirst circumnavi- 
gatrix of the Cape of Good Hope, and as the queen of 
Africa and the mistress of the Indies and Brazil — had not 

' Alison's Hist, of Europe during the French Revolution, vol. i. p. 
546. Thus Ulster, to which Holland has been assimilated, could, in 
1 782, display a Volunteer or self-maintained force, independent of those 
who would have served for pay, greater in amount than the whole of the 
available regular army of the Dutch government — and this, after cen- 
turies of prosperity on the part of Holland, and the very reverse on that 
of Ireland ! The proportions and entire strength of the Volunteers of 
1782 were as follow : — 

Ulsteu 34,152 

Leinster 22,283 

Munster 18,056 

Connaught 14,336 

88,827 

Twenty-two addhional corps, estimated at 12,000 men, made the entire 
Volunteer Army 100,827 ! {Grattan's Miscel. Works, p. 129 and 30.) 
Every true Irishman should blush at the political contrast of his country 
to Holland. 

2 Hume's England, vol. ii. p. 112. — Cowie'sedit. 

^ Voltaire's Univ. Hist. chap, cxxxviii. voL in. p. 288. 



368 THE GREEN BOOK. 

(even long after she had raised herself to such a pitch of 
wealth, power, and grandeur) a total military population 
of 300,000 7nen, This appears from an official register 
taken by the Spanish government in 1637, or only 3 years 
before the separation of Portugal from Spain, by the insur- 
rection which raised the present family, or that of Braganza, 
to the Portuguese crown, and was legalized at length, in 
1668, by the acknowledgment, on the part of Spain, of "the 
independence of Portugal." From this official register, it 
was found that, in 1637, Portugal contained 7io more than 
210,000 men capable of carrying arms? Yet, though 
possessed of eight or ten times the national military popu- 
lation of Portugal, in addition to the forces which might be 
drawn from the various extensive countries subject to the 
Spanish empire ; though divided from Portugal, along the 
whole of the northern and eastern frontier of that country, 
by a mere land boundary, and having sufficient maritime 
resources to attack its southern and eastern sides by sea ; 
though commanding the immense treasures of the American 
mines, while Portugal had been reduced to the greatest po- 
verty and distress by the unprecedented plunder, to which, 
chiefly owing to the non- convocation of her Cortes or Par- 
liament, she was subjected during the Union of the two 
countries ; though wielding such manifestly superior re- 
sources in every respect, Spain was unable to subdue a 
revolt, and was compelled to acknowledge an independence, 
as complete on the part of Portugal, as England, in 1783, 
was obliged to grant to only three millions of once de- , 
spised Americans. 

Prussia, on Frederick the Great's accession to the throne 
in 1740, had, says an eminent writer, a revenue of but 
^1,233,332 sterling, and a population not exceeding 
2,240,000 souls. Her army, with this small population 
and low revenue, amounted to 76,000 men, of whom 26,000 
were foreigners. With these troops, which had seen no 
more real service than the Irish volunteers, Frederick in- 
vaded Silesia in the year 1741, and eventually conquered it 
from Austria. In the seven years' war, subsequently un- 
dertaken to recover Silesia and punish Frederick, by ex- 
pelling him from and partitioning his dominions, Prussia 
was attacked by Austria, backed by the German Empire, 

^ Modern Univ. Hist, book xxiii. chap. ii. vol. viii. p. 498. 



THE GREEN BOOK. 



369 



Russia, France, and Sweden— a confederation comprising a 
military force of above 500,000 men, and when compared to 
that of Prussia, far greater than the power directed against 
Napoleonby the Allies. The Prussian dominions, surrounded 
and naturally accessible on almost every point to the most 
formidable enemies, were repeatedly entered, ravaged, 
plundered, and the capital taken. Yet Prussia, on the 
peace of Hubertsburg, in 1763, emerged from this appa- 
rently desperate contest a power of the first rank. And all 
this was done with no greater annual revenue, during the 
war, including the subsidies from England, than £'4,000,000. 
Finally, at the death of Frederick the Great, in 1786, the 
population of the Prussian monarchy was but 7,000,000, 
and its yearly revenue only about £4,500,000.^ Out of 
this revenue and population, Frederick, according to Mira- 
beau, kept up an army of 150,000 infantry and 40,000 
cavalry, at a charge to the state under £1,500,000 a year — 
a sum less, says an able writer, in 1828, than " the duties, 
annually, on Irish whisky alone, if fairly levied and ap- 
plied, would amount to."'' The seemingly unfavourable 
geographical position of Prussia for purposes of defence, 
even in 1792, or after so many acquisitions of territory had 
been made by the monarchy, is thus described by Mr. Ali- 
son : " Nature," says he, ''had traced out no limits like 

the Rhine, the Alps, or the Pyrenees, to form the boundary 
of its dominions ; no great rivers or mountain chains pro- 
tected its frontiers ; few fortified towns guarded it from the 
incursions of the vast military monarchies with which it 
was surrounded:' Then, after stadng the extent of the 
Prussian possessions at 14,000 square leagues, and men- 
tioning that the population had increased to "eight mil- 
lions:' the historian adds— " but they were composed of 
various races, spoke different languages, and professed 
different religions, and were protected by no external nor 
internal line of fortresses. Towards Russian and Aus- 
trian Poland, ^frontier of 200 leagues was totally des- 
titute of places of defence. Silesia alone enjoyed the 
<iouble advantage of three lines of fortresses, and the choicest 
' gifts of nature. The national defence rested entirely 
^n the army and the courage of the inhabitants!"^ 

^ Alison, vol. V. p. 180. 

2 Alison, vol. i. p. 534. 

31* 



370 THE GREEN BOOK. 

Such was Prussia in the immediate neighbourhood of im- 
mense warlike empires, with whose great superiority in 
territorial extent, military numbers, and financial capabili- 
ties, HER resources, especially in their original state, were, 
to all appearance, so completely unable to cope. 

A due reflection, then, upon such historical information, 
and the large number of soldiers and seamen proved to 
have been contributed by Ireland to the military and naval 
defence of the empire, will evince what such a nation may 
be made for or against England, and show how ridiculous 
as well as unsafe must be any system of policy, based on 
the Lyndhurst principle of treating the Irish people as 
" aliens in blood, aliens in religion, and aliens in language," 
and relying, for the support of such injustice, on what has 
been demonstrated to be the very questionable competency 
of '' the British heart and the British arm." 

In fact, before the Union can be said to be maintainea 
by " the British heart and the British arm," or by any 
other power that Toryism may choose to boast of, the terms 
of that act must first be fulJillecL And, bad as it was, 
originating as it did in what the present Chief Justice Bushe 
styled, '' an intolerance of Irish prosperity," its most im- 
portant provision, or that as to the amount w^hich Ireland 
was to contribute to the imperial national debt, has, even 
according to English testimony, been most flagrantly vio- 
lated. By a parliamentary return, moved for by Mr. Finn, 
ordered to be printed August 13th, 1833, and marked No. 
659, the British national debt in 1800, the year of the Union, 
was ^420,305,944, while the public debt of Ireland was 
but £26,841,219. By the Union, Ireland had a separate 
Exchequer, and, unless the English debt should be reduced 
to an equality with her's, she was only to be taxed, for the 
future, in the proportion which her £26,841,219 bore to 
the £420,305,944 of Great Britain. But, in 1816, — when, 
to prevent Ireland from perceiving any longer the robbery 
committed against her, the Irish and British exchequers 
were united, in direct violation of the Union, — the national 
debt of Ireland had been raised, by a British or Union par- 
liament, from £26,841,219 to £110,730,519, the British 
debt of £420,305,944, having been augmented, during the 
same period, only to £705,581,420. In other words, the 
British debt wanted about £135,000,000 of being doubled^ 



THE GREEX BOOK. 371 

while the Irish deht was some millions more than quadru- 
pled! To bear only the same ratio of increase as the debt of 
Great Britain, fromi)420,305,944 in 1800 to ^705,581,420 
in 1816, the Irish debt, instead of having been swelled up, 
in tjie same period, from ^26,841,219 to ^110,730,519, 
should only have been i^45,059,237. On the same prin- 
ciple that, in round numbers, the ^£26, 000, 000 of Ireland 
were made i^l 10,000,000, the ^420,000,000 of Great Bri- 
tain ought to have been ^1,734,000,000. 

Thus, in addition to the '' embrace of swords," embodied 
in the arbitrary measure for crushing the fair expression of 
Irish opinion with respect to the Union, and, indeed, exem- 
plified in the general tenor of English policy to this country, 
here is a " gripe of robbery" demonstrated, which no so- 
phistry can ever mystify. Yet the same provincializing 
measure, which has led to this manifest injustice, likewise 
subjects us to the abstraction of the far greater portion of 
our national revenue, of at least £5,000,000 a year, an 
annual absentee drain of about £5,000,000 more, and, in 
fine, the existence of a state of things, that every day more 
and more *' cries to heaven for vengeance," by " defrauding 
the labourer of his hire," or diverting, from a native to a 
foreign expenditure and employment, a greater sum than 
has ever been derived by any one civilized country from 
the impoverishment and misery of another. For these 
evils there may be many palliatives, though there can be 
but one radical remedy, a Repeal of the Union, which, 
unless Irishmen are both morally and physically inferior to 
the rest of the human species, I think it is pretty clear, from 
the foregoing historical facts, that we can attain, if we only 
will to do so. And, should the restoration of such an equally 
just and natural connexion between the two islands be too 
long deferred, the necessarily intolerable increase amongst 
us of so many serious evils, with a proportionably increasing 
population, is calculated to put a reflecting disposition in 
mind of the curious, and perhaps prophetic, observations 
of the poet Spencer, in the reign of Elizabeth. "There 
have bin," says he, *' divers good plottes devised, and wise 
councels cast already about reformation of that realme, but 
they say, it is the fatall destiny of that land, that no pur- 
poses whatsoever which are meant for her good, will prosper 
or take good effect, which, whether it proceed from the 



372 THE GREEN BOOK. 

very genius of the soyle, or influence of the starres, or that 
Almighty God hath not yet appointed the time of her refor- 
mation, or that he reserveth her in this unquiet state still 
for some secret scourge, ivhich shall by her come unto 
England, it is hard to he knowne, but yet much to be 
feared !"' 

' View of the State of Ireland, p. 1. 



373 



APPENDIX. 



IS THE SCOTCH UNION AN ARGUMENT FOR THE 
IRISH UNION 1 



-Crimine ab uno, 



Disce omnes, Virgil. 

John Bull fleeces Sawny, and Paddy, his brother, 
By two Unions — for one's just as bad as the other. 

Free Translation. 



The unforeseen length to which the observations on Irish military 
history have run, and the circumstance of the other compositions alluded 
to in page 111 having been before in print, oblige the author, contrary 
to his original intention, to Hmit his appendix to the subjoined compen- 
dium of the able article on Repeal in Taifs Magazine for December, 
1838, adverted to and promised in note I, page 141. Coming, as the 
article does, from such a good judge of the wants of his own country as 
Tail — proving, as it does, in connexion with the unanswerable financial 
fact in the last-mentioned note and page of this volume, that Scotland 
WOULD be better off with a domestic legislature than without one — and 
thus completely refuting the superficial assertions of those, who attempt 
to argue, from the supposed benefits of a Union to Scotland, that such 
a measure should also be beneficial to Ireland — ^the importance of the 
production entitles it to a degree of attention far above that generally 
afforded to the effusions of mere periodical literature. Having remarked, 
in a previous portion of his honest and spirited periodical, upon the little 
attention given to Scotch affairs in the London legislature, (for such 
only it should be considered and entitled,) Tail writes thus: — 

^^ Repeal of the Union. — Necessity of Local Legislation. — The pre- 
ceding notice of the legislation affecting Scotland at a most important 
period, shows how little of the time of Parliament is dedicated to our 
peculiar concerns. Out of a huge folio, there are not more than 5 act, 
not exceeding 20 pages in all, in which the name of old Scotland is to 

be found, or its existence recognised In the statute-book of Scotland, 

the old Scotch acts — in 3 small octo-decimo volumes of 500 or 600 pages 
each — we find from 40 to 50 of printed, or, as they would now be called, 
public acts, besides local and personal, passed in a session which lasted 
a month or 6 weeks only. And, if we look to these acts, we shall find 
that they are, at least, as important, in every point of view, to Scotch- 



374 APPENDIX. 

men, as the modern legislation of the three kingdoms. To take for 
example the first year that turns up to us — 1696 — when the kingdom 

was in a state of quiet we find that the Scotch Parliament met at 

Edinburgh on the 8th September, and adjourned on the r2th of October, 
during which 46 acts were passed ' What is not the least remark- 
able part of the matter is, that the whole 46 acts are contained in 48 
small octodecimo pages. Nearly the whole of those relating to the law 
are, to this day, in force, the experience of a century and a half hav- 
ing been able to add little or nothing to the efficacy of the provisions 

And all of them have not given as much trouble in their interpretation 
to our courts of law, short as they are, as the Judicature Act, the Cessio 
Act, or any act relative to the law which has been passed within the last 
quarter of a century. 

No one, we imagine, will be so absurd as to pretend, that the affairs 
of Scotland can be as efficiently managed by a legislative body sitting 
hundreds of miles from her territory, and having the interests of an 
empire dispersed over the whole face of the earth, and containing more 
than 100,000,000 of human beings, to attend to, as by a Parliament meet- 
ing in Edinburgh. The Imperial Parliament is, in truth, unfitted for 
that department of legislation, called local and personal. Such legisla- 
tion is best conducted on the spot, or as near as possible to the spot, 
which is to be affected. Witnesses are then at hand, information can 
be got with expedition and with little expense ; the members of a local 
parliament can be dismissed and called together with little inconvenience. 
The expense at present necessarily incurred for a Road, a Harbour, or 
a Railway Bill for Scotland is intolerable. One thousand pounds a mile, 
even in long lines, is not an exaggerated estimate for the mere parlia- 
mentary expenses of obtaining the bill. The members of an Imperial 
Parliament, the great majority of whom must naturally feel indifferent 
regarding the failure or success of any such measure, can with the utmost 
difficulty be got to attend, or even to remain in the house, when the 
matter is under discussion ; and it is even not easily accomplished to get 
a quorum of the committee, to whom the Bill is remitted, to go through' 
their routine duties. Then, all matters relative to Scotland are slurred 
over in the reports of the debates — first, because the reporters think a 
Scotch bill, though vitally affecting Scotland, is of no public importance; 
secondly, because they cannot intelligibly report what they, in general, 
do not understand ; and, third, because ' Scotch' business is generally 
put off till past midnight, an hour at which, except on extraordinary 
occasions, the reporters, by a well-organized combination — Whig, Tory, 
and Radical reporters agreeing in this point — retire from their labour. 
The consequence is, that there is hardly a measure, however important, 
affecting Scotland, of the grounds for passing which her population are 
duly informed. All that they see of a long debate, on a subject in which 
they perhaps take the most intense interest, is a line or two, in which 

^ The detail of several of those acts, though of the highest legal con- 
sequence to Scotland, and of other useful measures on matters of com- 
merce, finance, &c., specified by Tail as having been passed in this 
native " parUament oi four iveeks^ duration," is left out, as uninteresting 
to a general reader. 



APPENDIX. 375 

the very title of the bill is probably bungled, and its object misrepresented. 
We think it full time that this system should be remodelled. The Im- 
perial Parliament has not time, in this age of speechification and infinite 
gabble, were it otherwise qualified, to do any thing like justice, or even 
to get through with decency the business before it. The Sessions have, 
of late years, been lengthened more and more, and the daily period of 
sitting goes on increasing, till not only the faculties of the members are 
obviously obscured, but their health impaired, and their lives themselves 
shortened. Besides, the non-residence of the members — the richest and 
most influential members in society — proves eminently prejudicial not 
only to Scotland, but to Ireland, and the parts of England itself remote 
from the metropolis. Hence, all the evils of absenteeism. We have 
not, at this moment, out of eight ij-nlne Scotch nobility, one resident in 
Edinburgh, and very few of our considerable landed proprietors. Their 
visits, even to their estates, are short and far between, whereby the 
tenantry and peasantry on their estates are deprived of their aid and 
countenance in useful schemes ; and excluded from the consumption, in 
their own district, and among themselves, of those fruits which their 
own industry and labour have created. Of much, if not all, of these 
evils, an Imperial Parliament, sitting for three-fourths of the year in 

London, is the cause One of the mischiefs attending the present 

lengthened sittings in Parliament, which ought not to be overlooked, is, 
that it limits the choice of members, and confines it almost exclusively 
to the landed interest. No person engaged in any extensive business, 
except in London, can afford to represent a constituency. Nor is it 
certain, that even the payment of members would extend the choice to 
eligible men, not in independent circumstances. Many fit persons would 
not choose to give up their business and go into Parliament, although 
insured of £300 or £500, for one year. Were, however, our Sessions 
as short as those of the old Scotch Parliaments, or of the United States, 
the encroachment upon other pursuits would be so inconsiderable as not 
to prevent the most able men, and the best men of business in the 
country, accepting the office of Representative. What is meant, by a 
Repeal of the Union with Ireland, we do not exactly understand ; but 
if all that is intended is, that the Irish should have the management 
of their own exclusive concerns, we heartily wish them success : and we 
hope that, when the people of Scotland shall see the necessity of a legis- 
lature in Edinburgh, the Irish will assist them in obtaining it." 

So much for the benefits resulting, either on one side of the channel 
or the other, from the intolerable systems of centralizing imposture and 
robbery called Unions — Unions of brose for the Scotch, potatoes for the 
Irish, and meat, cheese, and malt liquor, for the English, who alone 
profit by such a state of things. 



FINIS. 



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